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PREFATORY NOTE 

Shortly before his death, Dr. Clarke selected 
the material for this book, and partly prepared it 
for publication. He wished thus to preserve some 
of his papers which had excited interest when 
printed in periodicals or read as lectures. 

With slight exceptions, the book is issued just 
as prepared by the author. 



CONTENTS 

Page 
LITERARY STUDIES, 

Lyric and Dramatic Elements in Literature and 

Art .3 

Dualism in National Life 28 

Deo Shakespeare write Bacon's Works? . . 38 
The Evolution of a Great Poem : Gray's Elegy 60 

RELIGIOUS AND PHILOSOPHICAL. 

Affinities of Buddhism and Christianity . . 71 

Why I am not a Free-Religionist .... 90 

Have Animals Souls? 100 

Apropos of Tyndall 128 

Law and Design in Nature 149 

HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL. 

The Two Carlyles, or Carlyle Past and Present . 162 

Buckle and his Theory of Averages . . . 196 

Voltaire 235 

Ralph Waldo Emerson 270 

Harriet Martineau 284 

The Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in Amer- 
ica 312 



LITERARY STUDIES 



LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS IN 
LITERATURE AND ART 

The German philosophy has made a distinction 
between the Subjective and the Objective, which 
has been found so convenient that it has been al- 
ready naturalized and is almost acclimated in our 
literature. 

The distinction is this : in all thought there are 
two factors, the thinker himself, and that about 
which he thinks. All thought, say our friends the 
Germans, results from these two factors : the sub- 
ject, or the man thinking; and the object, what 
the man thinks about. All that part of thought 
which comes from the man himself, the Ego, 
they call subjective ; all that part which comes 
from the outside world, the non-Ego, they call ob- 
jective. 

I am about to apply this distinction to literature 
and art ; but instead of the terms Subjective and 
Objective, I shall use the words Lyric and Dra- 
matic, 

For example, when a writer or an artist puts 
a great deal of himself into his work, I call him 
a lyric writer or artist. Lyrical, in poetry, is the 



4 LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 

term applied to that species of poetry which directly 
expresses the individual emotions of the poet. On 
the other hand, I call an artist or poet dramatic 
when his own personality disappears, and is lost 
in that which he paints or describes. A lyric or 
subjective writer gives us more of himself than of 
the outside world ; a dramatic or objective writer 
gives us more of the outside world than of him- 
self. 

Lyric poetry is that which is to be sung ; the 
lyre accompanies song. Now, song is mainly 
personal or subjective. It expresses the singer's 
personal emotions, feelings, desires ; and for these 
reasons I select this phrase " lyric " to express all 
subjective or personal utterances in art. 

The drama, on the other hand, is a photograph 
of life ; of live men and women acting themselves 
out freely and individually. The dramatic writer 
ought to disappear in his drama ; if he does not 
do so he is not a dramatic writer, but a lyrist in 
disguise. 

The dramatic element is the power of losing one's 
self — opinions, feeling, character — in that which 
is outside and foreign, and reproducing it just as 
it is. In perfect dramatic expression the personal 
equation is wholly eliminated. The writer disap- 
pears in his characters ; his own hopes and fears, 
emotions and convictions, do not color his work. 

But the lyric element works in the opposite way. 
In song, the singer is prominent more than what 



LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 5 

he sings. He suffuses his subject with his own 
thoughts and feelings. If he describes nature, he 
merely gives us the feelings it awakens in his own 
mind. If he attempts to write a play, we see the 
same actor thinly disguised reappearing in all the 
parts. 

Now, there is a curious fact connected with 
this subject. It is that great lyric and dramatic 
authors or artists are apt to appear in duads or 
pairs. Whenever we meet with a highly subjec- 
tive writer, we are apt to find him associated with 
another as eminently objective. This happens so 
often that one might imagine that each type of 
thought attracts its opposite and tends to draw 
it out and develop it. It may be that genius, 
when it acts on disciples who are persons of talent, 
draws out what is like itself, and makes imitators ; 
when it acts on a disciple who himself possesses 
genius, it draws out what is opposite to itself and 
develops another original thinker. Genius, like 
love, is attracted by its opposite, or counterpart. 
Love and genius seek to form wholes ; they look 
for what will complete and fulfill themselves. 
When, therefore, a great genius has come, fully 
developed on one side, he exercises an irresistible 
attraction on the next great genius, in whom 
the opposite side is latent, and is an important 
factor in his development. Thus, perhaps, we ob- 
tain the duads, whose curious concurrence I will 
now illustrate by a few striking instances. 



6 LYBIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 

Beginning our survey with English literature, 
who are the first two great poets whose names 
occur to us ? Naturally, Chaucer and Spenser. 
Now, Chaucer is eminently dramatic and objective 
in his genius ; while Spenser is distinctly a lyrical 
and subjective poet. 

Chaucer tells stories ; and story-telling is objec- 
tive. One of the most renowned collections of 
stories is the " Arabian Nights ; " but who knows 
anything about the authors of those entertaining 
tales ? They are merely pictures of Eastern life, 
reflected in the minds of some impersonal authors, 
whose names even are unknown. 

Homer is another great story-teller ; and Homer 
is so objective, so little of a personality, that some 
modern critics suppose there may have been several 
Homers. 

Chaucer is a story-teller also ; and in his stories 
everything belonging to his age appears, except 
Chaucer himself. His writings are full of pictures 
of life, sketches of character ; in one word, he is 
a dramatic or objective writer. He paints things 
as they are, — gives us a panorama of his period. 
Knights, squires, yeomen, priests, friars, pass be- 
fore us, as in Tennyson's poem " The Lady of 
Shalott." 

The mind of an objective story-teller, like Chau- 
cer, is the faithful mirror, which impartially re- 
flects all that passes before it, but cracks from side 
to side whenever he lets a personal feeling enter 



LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 7 

his mind, for then the drama suddenly disappears 
and a lyric of personal hope or fear, gladness or 
sadness, takes its place. 

Spenser is eminently a lyric poet. His own 
genius suffuses his stories with a summer glow of 
warm, tender, generous sentiment. In his descrip- 
tions of nature he does not catalogue details, but 
suggests impressions, which is the only way of 
truly describing nature. There are some waiters 
who can describe scenery, so that the reader feels 
as if he had seen it himself. The secret of all 
such description is that it does not count or mea- 
sure, but suggests. It is not quantitative but quali- 
tative analysis. It does not apply a foot rule to 
nature, but gives the impression made on the mind 
and heart by the scene. I have never been at 
Frascati nor in Sicily, but I can hardly persuade 
myself that I have not seen those places. I have 
distinct impressions of both, simply from reading 
two of George Sand's stories. I have in my mind 
a picture of Frascati, with deep ravines, filled 
with foliage ; with climbing, clustering, straggling 
vines and trees and bushes ; with overhanging 
crags, deep masses of shadow below, bright sun- 
shine on the stone pines above. So I have another 
picture of Sicilian scenery, wide and open, with 
immense depths of blue sky, and long reaches of 
landscape; ever-present Etna, soaring snow-clad 
into the still air ; an atmosphere of purity, filling 
the heart with calm content. It may be that 



8 LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 

Catania and Frascati are not like this ; but I feel 
as if I had seen them, not as if I had heard them 
described. 

It is thus that Spenser describes nature ; by- 
touching some chord of fancy in the soul. Notice 
this picture of a boat on the sea : — 

" So forth they rowed ; and that Ferryman 
With his stiff oars did brush the sea so strong 
That the hoar waters from his frigate ran, 
And the light bubbles danced all along 
Whiles the salt brine out of the billows sprang ; 
At last, far off, they many islands spy, 
On every side, floating the floods among." 

You notice that you are in the boat yourself, 
and everything is told as it appears to you there ; 
you see the bending of the " stiff oars " by your 
side, and the little bubbles dancing on the water, 
and the islands, not as they are, rock-anchored, 
but as they seem to you, floating on the water. 
This is subjective description, — putting the reader 
in the place, and letting him see it all from that 
point of view. So Spenser speaks of the " oars 
sweeping the watery wilderness ; " and of the gusty 
winds " filling the sails with fear." 

Perhaps the highest description ought to include 
both the lyric and dramatic elements. Here is a 
specimen of sea description, by an almost unknown 
American poet, Fenner, perfect in its way. The 
poem is called " Gulf Weed : " — 



LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 9 

" A weary weed washed to and fro, 

Drearily drenched in the ocean brine ; 
Soaring high, or sinking low, 

Lashed along without will of mine ; 
Sport of the spoom of the surging sea, 

Flung on the foam afar and near ; 
Mark my manifold mystery, 

Growth and grace in their place appear. 

" I bear round berries, gray and red, 

Rootless and rover though I be ; 
My spangled leaves, when nicely spread, 

Arboresce as a trunkless tree ; 
Corals curious coat me o'er 

White and hard in apt array ; 
Mid the wild waves' rude uproar 

Gracefully grow I, night and day. 

" Hearts there are on the sounding shore, 

(Something whispers soft to me,) 
Restless and roaming for evermore, 

Like this weary weed of the sea ; 
Bear they yet on each beating breast 

The eternal Type of the wondrous whole, 
Growth unfolding amidst unrest, 

Grace informing the silent soul." 

All nature becomes alive in the Spenserian 
description. Take, for example, the wonderful 
stanza which describes the music of the " Bower 
of Bliss:" — 

" The joyous birds, shrouded in cheerful shade 
Their notes unto the voice attemper'd sweet ; 
Th' angelical, soft, trembling voices made 
To the instruments divine respondence meet ; 
The silver-sounding instruments did meet 



10 LYBIC AND BBAMATIC ELEMENTS 

With the bass murmur of the water's fall ,* 
The water's fall, with difference discreet, 
Now loud, now low, unto the winds did call ; 
The gentle warbling winds low answered to all." 

Consider the splendid portrait of Belphcebe : — 

" In her fair eyes two living lamps did flame, 
Kindled above at the Heavenly Maker's light ; 
And darted fiery beams out of the same, 
So passing piercing, and so wondrous bright, 
They quite bereaved the rash beholder's sight; 
In them the blinded god his lustful fire 
To kindle oft essay'd but had no might, 
For with dread majesty and awful ire 
She broke his wanton darts and quenched base desire. 

" Her ivory forehead, full of bounty brave, 
Like a broad tablet did itself dispread, 
For love his lofty triumphs to engrave, 
And write the battles of his great godhead ; 
All good and honor might therein be read, 
For there their dwelling was ; and when she spake, 
Sweet words, like dropping honey she did shed ; 
And, twixt the pearls and rubies softly brake 
A silver Sound, that heavenly music seemed to make." 

If we examine this picture, we see that it is not 
a photograph, such as the sun makes, but a lover's 
description of his mistress. He sees her, not as 
she is, but as she is to him. He paints her out of 
his own heart. In her eyes he sees, not only bril- 
liancy and color, but heavenly light ; he reads in 
them an untouched purity of soul. Looking at her 
forehead, he sees, not whiteness and roundness, 
but goodness and honor. 



LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 11 

Shakespeare's lovers always describe their mis- 
tresses in this way, out of their own soul and heart. 
It is his own feeling that the lover gives, seeing 
perhaps " Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt." 

After Chaucer and Spenser the next great Eng- 
lish poets whose names naturally occur to us are 
Shakespeare and Milton. 

Now, Shakespeare was the most objective dra- 
matic writer who ever lived ; while Milton was em- 
inently and wholly a subjective and lyrical writer. 

It is true that Shakespeare was so great that he 
is one of the very few men of genius in whom ap- 
pear both of these elements. In his plays he is so 
objective that he is wholly lost in his characters, 
and his personality absolutely disappears; in his 
sonnets he " unlocks his heart " and is lyrical and 
subjective ; he there gives us his inmost self, and 
we seem to know him as we know a friend with 
whom we have lived in intimate relations for years. 
Still, he will be best remembered by his plays ; 
and into them he put the grandeur and universal- 
ity of his genius ; so we must necessarily consider 
him as the greatest dramatic genius of all time. 
But he belonged to a group of dramatic poets of 
whom he was the greatest : Ben Jonson, Beaumont 
and Fletcher, Massinger, Ford, Webster, — any 
one of whom would make the fortune of the stage 
to-day. It was a great age of dramatic literature, 
and it came very naturally to meet a demand. 
The play then was what the novel is to-day. As 



12 LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 

people to-day have no sooner read a new novel than 
they want another, so, in Shakespeare's time, they 
had no sooner seen a new play than they ran to 
see another. Hence the amazing fertility of the 
dramatic writers. Thomas Heywood wrote the 
whole or a part of two hundred and twenty plays. 
The manager of one of the theatres bought a hun- 
dred and six new plays for his stage in six years ; 
and in the next five years a hundred and sixty. 
The price paid to an author for a play would now 
be equal to about two or three hundred dollars. 
The dramatic element, as is natural, abounds in 
these writings, though in some of them the au- 
thor's genius is plainly lyrical. Such, for example, 
is Massinger's, who always reminds me of Schiller. 
Both wrote plays, but in both writers the faculty 
of losing themselves in their characters is wanting. 
The nobleness of Schiller appears in all his works, 
and constitutes a large part of their charm. So in 
Massinger all tends to generosity and elevation. 
His worst villains are ready to be converted and 
turn saints at the least provocation. Their wick- 
edness is in a condition of unstable equilibrium ; 
it topples over, and goodness becomes supreme in 
a single moment. Massinger could not create 
really wicked people; their wickedness is like a 
child's moment of passion or willfulness, ending 
presently in a flood of tears, and a sweet reconcili- 
ation with his patient mother. But how different 
was it with Shakespeare ! Consider his Iago. 



LYBIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 13 

How deeply rooted was his villainy ! how it was 
a part of the very texture of his being ! He had 
conformed to it the whole philosophy of his life. 
His cynical notions appear in the first scene. Iago 
believes in meanness, selfishness, everything that is 
base ; to him all that seems good is either a pre- 
tense or a weakness. The man who does not seek 
the gratification of his own desires is a fool. 
There is to Iago nothing sweet, pure, fair, or true, 
in this world or the next. He profanes everything 
he touches. He sneers at the angelic innocence of 
Desdemona ; he sneers at the generous, impulsive 
soul of Othello. When some one speaks to him of 
virtue, he says " Virtue ? a fig ! 't is in ourselves 
that we are thus or thus. Our bodies are our gar- 
dens, to which our wills are gardeners." You can 
plant nettles or lettuce as you please. That is to 
say, there is no reality in goodness. The virtue of 
Desdemona will be gone to-morrow, if she takes 
the whim. The Moor's faith in goodness is folly ; 
it will cause him to be led by the nose. There is 
no converting such a man as that ; or only when, 
by means of terrible disappointments and anguish, 
he is brought to see the reality of human goodness 
and divine providence. And that can hardly hap- 
pen to him in this world. 

Iago is a murderer of the soul, Macbeth a mur- 
derer of the body. The wickedness of Macbeth 
is different from that of Iago ; that of Shylock 
and of Richard Third different again from either. 



14 LYBIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 

Macbeth is a half-brute, a man in a low state of 
development, with little intellect and strong pas- 
sions. Shylock is a highly intellectual man, not 
a cynic like Iago, but embittered by ill-treatment, 
made venomous by cruel wrong and perpetual con- 
tempt. Oppression has made this wise man mad. 
Richard Third, originally bad, has been turned into 
a cruel monster by the egotism born of power. 
He has the contempt for his race that belongs to 
the aristocrat, who looks on men in humbler places 
as animals of a lower order made for his use or 
amusement. Now, this wonderful power of differ- 
entiating characters belongs to the essence of the 
dramatic faculty. Each of these is developed 
from within, from a personal centre, and is true to 
that. Every manifestation of this central life is 
correlated to every other. If one of Shakespeare's 
characters says but ten words in one scene, and 
then ten words more in another, we recognize him 
as the same person. His speech bewTayeth him. 
So it is in human life. Every man is fatally con- 
sistent with himself. So, after we have seen a 
number of pictures by any one of the great masters, 
we recognize him again, as soon as we enter a gal- 
lery. We know him by a certain style. Infe- 
rior artists have a manner ; great artists have a 
style ; manner is born of imitation ; style of origi- 
nality. So, there is a special quality in every hu- 
man being, if he will only allow it to unfold. The 
dramatic faculty recognizes this. Its knowledge 



LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 15 

of man is not a philosophy, nor a mere knowledge 
of human nature, but a perception of individual 
character. It first integrates men as human be- 
ings ; then differentiates them as individuals. 
Play-writers, novelists, and artists who do not pos- 
sess this dramatic genius cannot grow their char- 
acters from within, from a personal centre of life ; 
but build them up from without, according to a 
plan. In description of nature, however, Shake- 
speare is, as he ought to be, subjective and lyric ; 
he touches nature with human feelings. Take his 
description of a brook : — 

" The current that with gentle murmur glides 
Thou know'st, being stopp'd impatiently doth rage ; 
But when his fair course is not hindered, 
He makes sweet music with the enamell'd stones, 
Giving a gentle kiss to every sedge 
He overtaketh in his pilgrimage, 
And so by many winding nooks he strays 
With willing sport to the wild ocean." 

The brook is gentle ; then it becomes angry ; 
then it is pacified and begins to sing ; then it stops 
to kiss the sedge ; then it is a pilgrim; and it 
walks willingly on to the ocean. 

So in his sonnet : — 

" Full many a glorious morning have I seen 
Flatter the mountain top with sovereign eye ; 
Kissing with golden face the meadows green, 
Gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy ; 
Anon permit the basest clouds to ride 
With ugly rack on his celestial face ; 
And from the forlorn world his visage hide, 



16 LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 

Stealing unseen to west with his disgrace ; 

Even so my sun one early morn did shine, 

With all triumphant splendor on my brow ; 

But out, alack ! he was but one hour mine ; 

The region cloud hath masked him from me now ; 

Yet him, for this, my love no whit disdaineth, 

Suns of this world may stain, when heaven's sun staineth." 

From Shakespeare, the marvel of dramatic gen> 
ius, turn to Milton, and we find the opposite ten- 
dency unfolded. 

The "Paradise Lost" is indeed dramatic in 
form, with different characters and dialogues, in 
hell, on earth, and in heaven. But in essence it is 
undramatic. Milton is never for a moment lost in 
his characters ; his grand and noble soul is always 
appearing. Every one speaks as Milton would 
have spoken had Milton been in the same place, 
and looked at things from the same point of view. 
Sin and Satan, for example, both talk like John 
Milton. Sin is very conscientious, and before she 
will unlock the gate of hell she is obliged to argue 
herself into a conviction that it is right to do so. 
Satan, she says, is her father, and children ought to 
obey their parents ; so, since he tells her to unlock 
the gate, she ought to do so. Death reproaches 
Satan, in good set terms, for his treason against 
the Almighty ; and Satan, as we all know, utters 
the noblest sentiments, and talks as Milton would 
have talked, had Milton been in Satan's position. 1 

1 See the argument to prove that it would not be difficult to 
climb to heaven. 



LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 17 

Coming down nearer to our own time, we find a 
duad of great English poets, usually associated in 
our minds, — Byron and Scott. 

Scott was almost the last of the dramatic poets 
of England, using the word dramatic in its large 
sense. His plays never amounted to much; but 
his stories in verse and in prose are essentially dra- 
matic. In neither does he reveal himself. In all 
his poetry you scarcely find a reference to his per- 
sonal feelings. In the L'Envoi to the " Lady of 
the Lake " there is a brief allusion of this sort, 
touching because so unusual, and almost the only 
one I now recall. Addressing the " Harp of the 
North " he says : — 

* l Much have I owed thy strains through life's long way, 
Through secret woes the world has never known, 
When on the weary night dawned wearier day, 
And bitterer was the grief devoured alone ; 
That I o'erlive such woes, Enchantress! is thine own." 

Scott, like Chaucer, brings before us a long suc- 
cession of characters, from many classes, countries, 
and times. Scotch barons and freebooters, Eng- 
lish kings, soldiers, gentlemen, crusaders, Alpine 
peasants, mediaeval counts, serfs, Jews, Saxons, — 
brave, cruel, generous, — all sweep past us, in a 
long succession of pictures ; but of Scott himself 
nothing appears except the nobleness and purity 
of the tone which pervades all. He is therefore 
eminently a dramatic or objective writer. 

But Byron is the exact opposite. The mighty 



18 LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 

exuberance of his genius, which captivated his age, 
and the echoes of which thrill down to ours, in all 
its vast overflow of passion, imagination, wit, — 
ever sounded but one strain, — himself. His own 
woes, his own wrongs are the ever-recurring theme. 
Though he wrote many dramas, he was more un- 
dramatic than Milton. Every character in every 
play is merely a thinly disguised Byron. It was 
impossible for him to get away from himself. If 
Tennyson's lovely line tells the truth when he 
says, — 

" Love took up the harp of life and smote on all its chords with 

might ; 
Smote the chord of self, that, trembling, passed in music out of 

sight : " 

then Byron never really loved ; for in his poetry 
the chord of self never passes out of sight. 

In his plays the principal characters are Byron 
undiluted — as Manfred, Sardanapalus, Cain, 
Werner, Arnold. All the secondary characters 
are Byron more or less diluted, — Byron and 
water, may we say ? Never, since the world be- 
gan, has there been a poet so steeped in egotism, 
so sick of self-love as he ; and the magnificence of 
his genius appears in the unfailing interest which 
he can give to this monotonous theme. 

But he was the example of a spirit with which 
the whole age was filled to saturation. Almost all 
the nineteenth century poets of England are sub- 
jective, giving us their own experience, sentiments, 



LYEIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 19 

reflections, philosophies. Wordsworth, Coleridge, 
Shelley, Keats, revolve in this enchanted and 
enchanting circle. Keats and Coleridge seem 
capable of something different. So, in the double 
star, made up of Wordsworth and Coleridge, the 
first is absolutely personal and lyric, the second 
sometimes objective and dramatic. And in that 
other double star of Shelley and Keats the same 
difference may be noted. 

A still more striking instance of the combina- 
tion of these antagonisms is to be found in our 
time, in Robert Browning and his wife. Mrs. 
Browning is wholly lyric, like a bird which sings 
its own tender song of love and hope and faith till 
" that wild music burdens every bough ; " and 
those " mournful hymns " hush the night to listen- 
ing sympathy. 

But in her husband we have a genuine renais- 
sance of the old dramatic power of the English 
bards. Robert Browning is so dramatic that he 
forgets himself and his readers too, in his charac- 
ters and their situations. To study the varieties 
of men and women is his joy ; to reproduce them 
unalloyed, his triumph. 

One curious instance of this self -oblivious immer- 
sion in the creations of his mind occurs to me. In 
one of his early poems called " In a Gondola " — 
as it first appeared — two lovers are happily con- 
versing, until in a moment, we know not why, the 
tone becomes one of despair, and they bid each 



20 LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 

other an eternal farewell. Why this change of 
tone there is no explanation. In a later edition he 
condescends to inform us, inserting a note to this 
effect: "He is surprised and stabbed." This is 
the opposite extreme to Milton's angels carefully- 
explaining to each other that they possess a speci- 
fic levity which enables them to drop upward. 

If we think of our own poets whose names are 
usually connected, — Longfellow and Lowell, for 
instance, — we shall easily see which is dramatic and 
which lyric. But the only man of truly dramatic 
faculty whom we have possessed was one in whom 
the quality never fully ripened, — I mean Edgar 
Allan Poe. 

In foreign literature we may trace the same 
tendency of men of genius to arrange themselves 
in couplets. Take, for instance, in Italy, Dante 
and Petrarch ; in France, Voltaire and Eousseau ; 
in Germany, Goethe and Schiller. Dante is dra- 
matic, losing himself in his stern subject, his 
dramatic characters ; his awful pictures of gloomy 
destiny. Petrarch is lyrical, personal, singing for- 
ever his own sad and sweet fate. Again, Voltaire 
is essentially dramatic, — immersed in things, ab- 
sorbed in life, a man reveling in all human acci- 
dent and adventure, and aglow with faith in an 
earthly paradise. The sad Eousseau goes apart, 
away from men ; standing like Byron, among them, 
but not of them ; in a cloud of thoughts that are 
not their thoughts. And, once more, though 



LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 21 

Goethe resembles Shakespeare in this, that some 
of his works are subjective, and others objective, — 
though, in the greatness of his mind he reconciles 
all the usual antagonisms of thought, — yet the 
fully developed Goethe, like the fully developed 
Shakespeare, disappears in his characters and 
theme. Life to him, in all its forms, was so in- 
tensely interesting that his own individual and 
subjective sentiments are left out of sight. But 
Schiller stands opposed to Goethe, as being a dra- 
matist devoid of dramatic genius, but full of per- 
sonal power ; so grand in his nobleness of soul, so 
majestic in the aspirations of his sentiment, so 
full of patriotic ardor and devotion to truth and 
goodness, that he moves all hearts as he walks 
through his dramas, — the great poet visible in 
every scene and every line. As his tried and 
noble friend says of him in an equally undying 
strain : — 

" Burned in his cheek, with ever-deepening fire, 
The spirit's youth, which never passes by ; 
The courage, which though worlds in hate conspire, 
Conquers at last their dull hostility ; 
The lofty faith, which ever, mounting higher, 
Now presses on, now waiteth patiently ; 
By which the good tends ever to its goal — 
By which day lights at last the generous soul." 

Goethe's characters and stories 'covered the 
widest range : Faust, made sick with too much 
thought, and seeking outward joy as a relief; 
Werther, a self-absorbed sentimentalist ; Tasso, an 



22 LYEIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 

Italian man of genius, a mixture of imagination, 
aspiration, sensitive self -distrust ; susceptible to 
opinion, sympathetic ; Iphigenia, a picture of an- 
tique calm, simplicity, purity, classic repose, like 
that of a statue ; Hermann and Dorothea, a sweet 
idyl of modern life, in a simple-minded German 
village with an opinionated, honest landlord, a 
talkative apothecary, a motherly landlady, a sen- 
sible and good pastor, and the two young lovers. 

This law of duality, or reaction of genius on 
genius, will also be found to apply to artists, phi- 
losophers, historians, orators. These also come in 
pairs, manifesting the same antagonistic qualities. 

Some artists are lyric ; putting their own souls 
into every face, every figure, making even a land- 
scape alive with their own mood ; adding — 

" A gleam 
Of lustre known to neither sea nor land 
But borrowed from the poet-painter's dream.' ' 

In every landscape of Claude we find the soul 
of Claude ; in every rugged rock-defile of Salvator 
we read his mood. These artists are lyric ; but there 
are also great dramatic painters, who give you, not 
themselves, but men and women ; so real, so differ- 
entiated, characters so full of the variety and 
antagonism of nature, that the whole life of a 
period springs into being at their touch. 

Take for instance two names, which always go 
together, standing side by side at the summit 
of Italian art, — Michael Angelo and Raphael. 



LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 23 

Though Raphael was a genius of boundless exu- 
berance, and poured on the wall and canvas a flood 
of forms, creating as nature creates, without pause 
or self-repetition, yet there is a tone in all which 
irresistibly speaks of the artist's own soul. He 
created a world of Raphaels. Grace, sweetness, 
and tenderness went into all his work. Every line 
has the same characteristic qualities. 

Turn to the frescoes by Michael Angelo in the 
Sistine Chapel. As we look up at those mighty 
forms — prophets, sibyls, seers, with multitudes of 
subordinate figures — we gradually trace in each 
prophet, king, or bard an individual character. 
Each one is himself. How fully each face and 
attitude is differentiated by some inward life. 
How each — David, Isaiah, Ezekiel, the Persian 
and the Libyan sibyl — stands out, distinct, filled 
with a power or a tenderness all his own. Mi- 
chael Angelo himself is not there, except as a foun- 
tain of creative life, from whose genius all these 
majestic persons come forth as living realities. 

Hanging on my walls are the well-known en- 
gravings of Guido's Aurora and Leonardo da 
Vinci's Last Supper. One of these is purely lyri- 
cal ; the other as clearly dramatic. 

The Aurora is so exquisitely lovely, the forms 
so full of grace, the movement of all the figures so 
rapid yet so firm, that I can never pass it without 
stopping to enjoy its charms. But variety is ab- 
sent. The hours are lovely sisters, as Ovid de- 
scribes sisters : — 



24 LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 

" Faeies non omnibus una, 
Nee diversa tamen, qualis decet esse sororum." 

But when we turn to the Last Supper, we see 
the dramatic artist at his best. The subject is 
such as almost to compel a monotonous treatment, 
but there is a wonderful variety in the attitudes 
and grouping. Each apostle shows by his atti- 
tude, gesture, expression, that he is affected dif- 
ferently from all the others. Even the feet under 
the table speak. Stand before the picture ; 
put yourself into the attitude of each apostle, 
and you will immediately understand his state of 
mind. 1 

The mediaeval religious artists were subjective, 
sentimental, lyrical. In a scene like the cruci- 
fixion, all the characters, whether apostles, Roman 
soldiers, or Jewish Pharisees, hang their heads like 
bulrushes. 

But see how Rubens, that great dramatic painter, 

1 Simon Peter's attitude expresses astonishment and perplexity. 
He holds out both hands, and seems to say, " It cannot be ! " 

In Thaddeus we see suspicion, doubt, distrust. " I always sus- 
pected him." 

Matthew is speaking* to Peter and Thomas, his hand held out 
toward Jesus : " But I heard him say so." 

Thomas : " What can it mean ? What will be the end ? " 

James: (Hands spread wide apart in astonished perplexity:) 
" Is it possible ? " 

Philip has laid both hands on his breast, and leaning toward 
Jesus says, "Lord, is it I ? " 

At the other end, one is leaning forward, his hands resting on 
the table, to catch the next words ; one starting back,' confused 
and confounded. 



LYBIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 25 

represents the scene. The Magdalen, wild with 
grief, with disheveled hair, has thrown herself at 
the foot of the cross, clasping and kissing the feet 
of Jesus. On the other faces are terror, dismay, 
doubt, unbelief, mockery, curiosity, triumph, de- 
spair, — according to each person's character and 
attitude toward the event. Meantime the Roman 
centurion, seated on his splendid horse, is deliber- 
ately and carefully striking his spear into the side 
of the sufferer. His face expresses only that he 
has a duty to perform and means to fulfill, it per- 
fectly. 

As Rubens is greatly dramatic, his pupil and 
follower, Vandyke, is a great lyrical artist, whose 
noble aspiration and generous sentiment shows 
itself in all his work. 

The school of Venice, with Titian and Tinto- 
retto at its head, is grandly dramatic and objec- 
tive. The school of Florence, with Guido and 
Domenichino at its head, eminently lyrical and 
subjective. 

If we had time, we might show that the two 
masters of Greek philosophy, Plato and Aristotle, 
are, the one lyrical, and intensely subjective, plato- 
nizing the universe ; and the other as evidently 
objective, immersed in the study of things ; re- 
joicing in their variety, their individuality, their 
persistence of type. 

The two masters of Greek history, Herodotus 
and Thucydides, stand opposed to each other in the 



26 LYBIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 

same way. Herodotus is the story-teller, the dra- 
matic raconteur, whose charming tales are as enter- 
taining as the " Arabian Nights." Thucydides is 
the personal historian who puts himself into his 
story, and determines its meaning and moral ac- 
cording to his own theories and convictions. 

We have another example in Livy and Tacitus. 

The two great American orators most fre- 
quently mentioned together are Webster and Clay. 
Though you would smile if I were to call either of 
them a lyric or a dramatic speaker, yet the essen- 
tial distinction we have been considering may be 
clearly seen in them. Clay's inspiration was per- 
sonal, his influence, personal influence. His theme 
was nothing ; his treatment of it everything. But 
Webster rose or fell with the magnitude and im- 
portance of the occasion and argument. When 
on the wrong side, he failed, for his intellect 
would not work well except in the service of 
reality and truth. But Clay was perhaps greatest 
when arguing against all facts and all reason. 
Then he summoned all his powers, — wit, illus- 
tration, analogy, syllogisms, appeals to feeling, 
prejudice, and passion ; and so swept along his 
confused and blinded audience to his conclusions. 

I think that subjective writers are loved more 
than dramatic. We admire the one and we love 
the other. We admire Shakespeare and love Mil- 
ton ; we admire Chaucer and love Spenser ; we 
admire Dante and love Petrarch ; we admire 



\. 



LYRIC AND DRAMATIC ELEMENTS 27 

Goethe and love Schiller ; and if Byron had not 
been so selfish a man, we should have loved him 
too. We admire Michael Angelo and love Raphael ; 
we admire Rubens and love Vandyke; we admire 
Robert Browning and love Mrs. Browning. In 
short, we care more for the man who gives us 
himself than for the man who gives us the whole 
outside world. 

I have been able to give you only a few hints 
of this curious distinction in art and literature. 
But if we carry it in our mind, we shall find it 
a key by which many doors may be unlocked. 
It will enable us to classify authors, and under- 
stand them better. 



DUALISM IN NATIONAL LIFE 

The science of comparative ethnology is one 
which has been greatly developed during the last 
twenty-five years. The persistence of race ten- 
dencies, as in the Semitic tribes, Jews and Arabs, 
or in the Teutonic and Celtic branches of the great 
Aryan stock, has been generally admitted. Though 
few would now say, with the ethnologist Knox, 
" Race is everything," none would wholly dispense 
with this factor, as Buckle did, in writing a history 
of civilization. 

Racial varieties have existed from prehistoric 
times. Their origin is lost in the remote past. 
As far as history goes back, we find them the same 
that they are now. When and how the primitive 
stock differentiated itself into the great varieties 
which we call Aryan, Semitic, and Turanian, no 
one can tell. But there are well-established vari- 
eties of which we can trace the rise and develop- 
ment ; I mean national varieties. The character 
of an Englishman or a Frenchman is as distinctly 
marked as that of a Greek or Roman. There is a 
general resemblance among all Englishmen ; and 
the same kind of resemblance among all French- 
men, Spaniards, Swedes, Poles. But this crystal- 



DUALISM IN NATIONAL LIFE 29 

lization into national types of character has taken 
place in a comparatively short period. We look 
back to a time when there were no Englishmen in 
Great Britain ; but only Danes, 4 Saxons, Normans, 
and Celts ; no Frenchmen in France ; but Gauls, 
Franks, and Romans. Gradually a distinct quality 
emerges, and we have Frenchmen, Italians, Eng- 
lishmen. The type, once arrived at, persists, and 
becomes more marked. It is marked by personal 
looks and manners, by a common temperament, 
a common style of thinking, feeling, acting ; the 
samfe kind of morals and manners. This type was 
formed by the action and reaction of the divers 
races brought side by side — Normans and Saxons 
mutually influencing each other in England, and 
being influenced again by climate, conditions of 
life, forms of government, national customs. So, 
at last, we have the well-developed national charac- 
ter, — a mysterious but very certain element, from 
which no individual can wholly escape. All drink 
of that one spirit. 

Thus far I have been stating what we all know. 
But now I would call your attention to a curious 
fact, which, so far as I am aware, has not before 
been noticed. It is this, — that when two nations, 
during their forming period, have been in relation 
to each other, there will be a peculiar character 
developed in each. That is to say, they will differ 
from each other according to certain well-defined 
lines, and these differences will repeat themselves 



30 DUALISM IN NATIONAL LIFE 

again and again in history, in curious parallelisms, 
or dualisms. 

To take the most familiar illustration of this : 
consider the national qualities of the French and 
English. The English and French, during several 
centuries, have been acting and reacting on each 
other, both in war and peace. Now, what are the 
typical characteristics of these two nations ? 
Stated in a broad way they might be described 
something as follows : — 

The English mind is more practical than ideal ; 
its movement is slow but persistent ; its progress 
is by gradual development ; it excels in the indus- 
trial arts ; it reverences power ; it loves liberty 
more than equality, not objecting to an aristocracy. 
It tends to individualism. Its conquests have been 
due to the power of order, and adherence to law. 

The French mind is more ideal than practical ; 
versatile, rather than persistent; its movements 
rapid, its progress by crises and revolution, rather 
than by development ; it excels in whatever is 
tasteful and artistic ; it admires glory rather than 
power ; loves equality more than liberty ; objects 
to an aristocracy, but is ready to yield individual 
rights at the bidding of the community ; renoun- 
cing individualism for the sake of communism ; 
and its successes have been due to enthusiasm 
rather than to organization. 

Next, look at the Greeks and Romans. These 
peoples were in intimate relations during the form-^ 



DUALISM IN NATIONAL LIFE 31 

ing period of national life ; and we find in them 
much the same contrasts of character that we do 
in the English and the French. The Romans were 
deficient in imagination, rather prosaic, fond of 
rule and fixed methods, conservative of ancient 
customs. The Greeks were quick and versatile ; 
artistic to a high degree ; producing masterpieces 
of architecture, painting, statuary, and creating 
every form of literature ; inventing the drama, the 
epic poem, oratory, odes, history, philosophy. The 
Romans borrowed from them their art and their 
literature, but were themselves the creators of law, 
the organizers of force. The Greeks and Romans 
were the English and French of antiquity ; and 
you will notice that they occupy geographically the 
same relative positions, — the Greeks and French 
on the east ; the Romans and English on the west. 
But now observe another curious fact. The 
Roman Empire and the Greek republics came to 
an end ; and in Greece no important nationality 
took the place of those wonderful commonwealths. 
But in Italy, by the union of the old inhabitants 
with the Teutonic northern invaders, modern Italy 
was slowly formed into a new national life. No 
longer deriving any important influence from 
Greece (which had ceased to be a living and inde- 
pendent force), Italy, during the Middle Ages, 
came into relations with Spain and the Spaniards. 
In Spain, as in Italy, a new national life was in 
process of formation by the union of the Gothic 



32 DUALISM IN NATIONAL LIFE 

tribes, the Mohammedan invaders, and the ancient 
inhabitants. The Spaniards occupied Sicily in 
1282, and Naples fell later into their hands, about 
1420, and in 1526 took possession of Milan. Thus 
Italy and Spain were entangled in complex rela- 
tions during their forming period. What was the 
final result ? Modern Italians became the very 
opposite of the ancient Romans. The Spaniards 
on the west are now the Romans, and the Italians, 
the Greeks. The Spaniards are slow, strong, con- 
servative ; the Italians, quick-witted, full of feel- 
ing and sentiment, versatile. The Spaniards trust 
to organization, the Italians to enthusiasm. The 
Spaniards are practical, the Italians ideal. In 
fine, the Spaniards, on the west, are like the Eng- 
lish and the ancient Romans ; the Italians, on the 
east, like the French and the Greeks. The Eng- 
lish pride, the Roman pride, the Spanish pride, we 
have all heard of ; but the French, the Greeks, and 
the Italians are not so much inclined to pride and 
the love of power, as to vanity and the love of fame. 
England, Rome, and Spain, united by law and 
the love of organization, gradually became solidi- 
fied into empires ; Greece, Italy, and France were 
always divided into independent states, provinces, 
or republics. 

Now, let us go east and consider two empires 
that have grown up, side by side, with constant 
mutual relations : Japan and China. The people 
of Japan, on the east, are described by all travelers 



DUALISM IN NATIONAL LIFE 33 

in language that might be applied to the ancient 
Greeks or the modern French. They are said to 
be quick-witted, lively, volatile, ready of apprehen- 
sion, with a keen sense of honor, which prefers 
death to disgrace ; eminently a social and pleasure- 
seeking people, fond of feasts, dancing, music, and 
frolics. Men and women are pleasing, polite, 
affable. On the other hand, the Chinese are de- 
scribed as more given to reason than to sentiment, 
prosaic, slow to acquire, but tenacious of all that is 
gained, very conservative, great lovers of law and 
order ; with little taste for art, but much national 
pride. They are the English of Asia ; the Japan- 
ese, the French. 

Go back to earlier times, when the two oldest 
branches of the great Aryan stock diverged on the 
table-lands of central Asia ; the Vedic race de- 
scending into India, and the Zend people passing 
west, into Persia. The same duplex development 
took place that we have seen in other instances. 
The people on the Indus became what they still 
are, — a people of sentiment and feeling. Like 
the French, they are polite, and cultivate civility 
and courtesy. The same tendency to local admin- 
istration which we see in France is found in India ; 
the commune being, in both, the germ-cell of na- 
tional life. The village communities in India are 
little republics, almost independent of anything 
outside. Dynasties change, new rulers and kings 
arrive; Hindoo, Mohammedan, English; but the 



34 DUALISM IN NATIONAL LIFE 

village community remains the same. Like the 
Japanese, the French, the Italians, the inhabitants 
of India are skillful manufacturers of ornamental 
articles. Their religion ■ tends to sentiment more 
than to morality, — to feeling, rather than to ac- 
tion. This is the development which India took 
when these races inhabited the Punjaub. But 
the ancient Persians were different. Their religion 
included a morality which placed its essence in 
right thinking and right action. A sentimental 
religion, like that of India and of Italy, tends to 
the adoration of saints and holy images and to 
multiplied ceremonies. A moral religion, like 
that of Persia, of Judea, and of the Teutonic races, 
tends to the adoration and service of the unseen. 
The Hindoos had innumerable gods, temples, idols. 
The Persians worshiped the sacred fire, without 
temple, priest, altar, sacrifice, or ritual. The an- 
cient Persians, wholly unlike the modern Persians, 
were a people of action, energy, enterprise. But 
when the old Persian empire fell, the character 
of the people changed. Just as in Italy the old 
Roman type disappeared, and was replaced by the 
opposite in the modern Italian, so modern Persia 
has swung round to the opposite pole of national 
character. The Persians and Turks, both profess- 
ing the Mohammedan religion, belong to different 
sects of that faith. The Turks are proud, tenacious 
of old customs, grave in their demeanor, generally 
just in their dealings, keeping their word. The 



DUALISM IN NATIONAL LIFE 35 

Persians, as they appear in the works of Malcolm 
and Monier, are changeable, kindly, polite, given 
to ceremonies, fond of poetry, with taste for fine 
art and decoration, — a mobile people. The Turk 
is silent, the Persian talkative. The Turk is proud 
and cold, the Persian affable and full of sentiment. 
In short, the Persian is the Frenchman, and the 
Turk the Englishman. And here again, as in the 
other cases, the French type of nationality unfolds 
itself on the east, and the English on the west. 

These national doubles have not been exhausted. 
We have other instances of twin nations, born of 
much the same confluence of race elements, of 
whom, as of Esau and Jacob, it might be predicted 
to the mother race, " Two nations shall be born 
of thee ; two kinds of people shall go forth from 
thee ; and the one shall be stronger than the 
other." Thus there are the twin races which in- 
habit Sweden and Norway ; the Swedes, on the 
east, are more intelligent, quick-witted, and ver- 
satile ; the Norwegians, on the west, slow, persist- 
ent, and disposed to foreign conquest and adven- 
ture, as shown in the sea-kings, who discovered Ice- 
land, Greenland, and Vinland ; and the modern 
emigrants who reap the vast wheatfields of Min- 
nesota. So, too, we might speak of the Poles and 
Germans. The Polish nation, on the east, resem- 
bling the French; the German, on the west, the 
English. 

But time will not allow me to carry out these 



36 DUALISM IN NATIONAL LIFE 

parallels into details. The question is, are these 
mere coincidences, or do they belong to the homo- 
logons of history, where the same law of progress 
repeats itself under different conditions, as the skel- 
eton of the mammal is found in the whale. Such 
curious homologons we find in national events, and 
they can hardly be explained as accidental coin- 
cidences. For instance, the English and French 
revolutions proceeded by six identical steps. First, 
an insurrection of the people. Secondly, the de- 
thronement and execution of the king. Thirdly, 
a military usurper. Fourthly, the old line restored. 
Fifthly, after the death of the restored king, his 
brother succeeds to the throne. Sixthly, a second 
revolution drives the brother into exile, and a con- 
stitutional king of a collateral branch takes his 
place. 

But if these doubles which I have described 
come by some mysterious law of polar force, as in 
the magnet, where the two kinds of electricity are 
repelled to opposite poles, and yet attract each 
other, how account for the regularity of the geo- 
graphical position ? Why is the French, Greek, 
Hindoo, Persian, Italian, Polish, Swedish type al- 
ways at the east, and the English, Roman, Iranic, 
Ottoman, Spanish, German, Norwegian type always 
at the west ? Are nations, like tides, affected by 
the diurnal revolution of the globe? This, I con- 
fess, I am unable to explain; and I leave it to 



DUALISM IN NATIONAL LIFE 37 

others to consider whether what I have described 
is pure coincidence, or if it belongs in some way 
to the philosophy of history and comes under uni- 
versal law. 



DID SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S 
WORKS 1 

The greatest of English poets is Shakespeare. 
The greatest prose writer in English literature is 
probably Bacon. Each of these writers, alone, 
is a marvel of intellectual grandeur. It is hard 
to understand how one man, in a few years, could 
have written all the masterpieces of Shakespeare, 
— thirty-six dramas, each a work of genius such 
as the world will never let die. It is a marvel 
that from one mind could proceed the tender 
charm of such poems as "Romeo and Juliet," 
" As You Like It," or " The Winter's Tale ; " 
the wild romance of " The Tempest," or of " A 
Midsummer Night's Dream ; " the awful tragedies 
of " Lear," " Macbeth," and " Othello ; " the pro- 
found philosophy of " Hamlet ; " the perfect fun 
of " Twelfth Night," and " The Merry Wives of 
Windsor ; " and the reproductions of Roman and 
English history. It is another marvel that a man 
like Bacon, immersed nearly all his life in busi- 
ness, a successful lawyer, an ambitious statesman, 
a courtier cultivating the society of the sovereign 
and the favorites of the sovereign, should also be 

1 The North American Beview, February, 1881. 



BIB SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WORKS 39 

the founder of a new system of philosophy, which 
has been the source of many inventions and new 
sciences down to the present day ; should have crit- 
ically surveyed the whole domain of knowledge, and 
become a master of English literary style. Each 
of these phenomena is a marvel ; but put them 
together, and assume that one man did it all, and 
you have, not a marvel, but a miracle. Yet, this 
is the result which the monistic tendency of modern 
thought has reached. Several critics of our time 
have attempted to show that Bacon, besides writing 
all the works usually attributed to him, was also 
the author of all of Shakespeare's plays and poems. 
This theory was first publicly maintained by 
Miss Delia Bacon in 1857. It had been, before, 
in 1856, asserted by an Englishman, William 
Henry Smith, but only in a small volume printed 
for private circulation. This book made a distin- 
guished convert in the person of Lord Palmerston, 
who openly declared his conviction that Bacon was 
the author of Shakespeare's plays. Two papers 
by Appleton Morgan, written in the same sense, 
appeared last year in " Appletons' Journal." But 
far the most elaborate and masterly work in sup- 
port of this attempt to dethrone Shakespeare, and 
to give his seat on the summit of Parnassus to 
Lord Bacon, is the book by Judge Holmes, pub- 
lished in 1866. He has shown much ability, and 
brought forward every argument which has any 
plausibility connected with it. 



40 DIB SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WOEES 

Judge Holmes was, of course, obliged to admit 
the extreme antecedent improbability of his posi- 
tion. Certainly it is very difficult to believe that 
the author of such immortal works should have 
been willing, for any reason, permanently to con- 
ceal his authorship ; or, if he could hide that fact, 
should have been willing to give the authorship 
to another ; or, if willing, should have been able 
so effectually to conceal the substitution as to blind 
the eyes of all mankind down to the days of Miss 
Delia Bacon and Judge Holmes. 

What, then, are the arguments used by Judge 
Holmes ? The proofs he adduces are mainly these : 
(1st) That there are many coincidences and paral- 
lelisms of thought and expression between the 
works of Bacon and Shakespeare ; (2d) that there 
is an amount of knowledge and learning in the 
plays, which Lord Bacon possessed, but which 
Shakespeare could hardly have had. Besides these 
principal proofs, there are many other reasons 
given which are of inferior weight, — a phrase in 
a letter of Sir Tobie Matthew ; another sentence 
of Bacon himself, which might be possibly taken 
as an admission that he was the author of " Bich- 
ard II. ; " the fact that some plays which Shake- 
speare certainly did not write were first published 
with his name or his initials. But his chief argu- 
ment is that Shakespeare had neither the learn- 
ing nor the time to write the plays, both of which 
Lord Bacon possessed ; and that there are curious 



BID SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WORKS 41 

coincidences between the plays and the prose 
works. 

These arguments have all been answered, and 
the world still believes in Shakespeare as before. 
But I have thought it might be interesting to show 
how easily another argument could be made of an 
exactly opposite kind, — how easily all these proofs 
might be reversed. I am inclined to think that if 
we are to believe that one man was the author both 
of the plays and of the philosophy, it is much more 
probable that Shakespeare wrote the works of 
Bacon than that Bacon w 7 rote the works of Shake- 
speare. For there is no evidence that Bacon was 
a poet as well as a philosopher ; but there is ample 
evidence that Shakespeare was a philosopher as 
well as a poet. This, no doubt, assumes that 
Shakespeare actually wrote the plays ; but this we 
have a right to assume, in the outset of the discus- 
sion, in order to stand on an equal ground with 
our opponents. 

The Bacon vis. Shakespeare argument runs thus : 
" Assuming that Lord Bacon wrote the works 
commonly attributed to him, there is reason to 
believe that he also w^rote the plays and poems 
commonly attributed to Shakespeare." 

The counter argument would then be : " As- 
suming that Shakespeare wrote the plays and 
poems commonly attributed to him, there is reason 
to believe that he also wrote the works commonly 
attributed to Bacon." 



42 BIB SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WORKS 

This is clearly the fair basis of the discussion. 
What is assumed on the one side on behalf of 
Bacon we have a right to assume on the other on 
behalf of Shakespeare. But before proceeding on 
this basis, I must reply to the only argument of 
Judge Holmes which has much apparent weight. 
He contends that it was impossible for Shake- 
speare, with the opportunities he possessed, to 
acquire the knowledge which we find in the plays. 
Genius, however great, cannot give the knowledge 
of medical and legal terms, nor of the ancient 
languages. Now, it has been shown that the plays 
afford evidence of a great knowledge of law and 
medicine ; and of works in Latin and Greek, 
French and Italian. How could such information 
have been obtained by a boy who had no ad- 
vantages of study except at a country grammar 
school, which he left at the age of fourteen, who 
went to London at twenty-three and became an 
actor, and who spent most of his life as actor, 
theatrical proprietor, and man of business ? 

This objection presents difficulties to us, and for 
our time, when boys sometimes spend years in the 
study of Latin grammar. We cannot understand 
the rapidity with which all sorts of knowledge 
were imbibed in the period of the Renaissance. 
Then every one studied everything. Then Greek 
and Latin books were read by prince and peasant, 
by queens and generals. Then all sciences and 
arts were learned by men and women, by young 



BIB SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WORKS 43 

and old. Thus speaks Robert Burton — who was 
forty years old when Shakespeare died : " What 
a world of books offers itself, in all subjects, arts 
and sciences, to the sweet content and capacity of 
the reader ! In arithmetic, geometry, perspective, 
opticks, astronomy, architecture, sculptura, pic- 
tura, of which so many and elaborate treatises 
have lately been written ; in mechanics and their 
mysteries, military matters, navigation, riding of 
horses, fencing, swimming, gardening, planting, 
great tomes of husbandry, cookery, faulconry, 
hunting, fishing, fowling; with exquisite pictures 
of all sports and games. . . . What vast tomes 
are extant in law, physic, and divinity, for profit, 
pleasure, practice. . . . Some take an infinite de- 
light to study the very languages in which these 
books were written : Hebrew, Greek, Syriac, Chal- 
dee, Arabick, and the like." This was the fashion 
of that day, to study all languages, all subjects, all 
authors. A mind like that of Shakespeare could 
not have failed to share this universal desire for 
knowledge. After leaving the grammar school, he 
had nine years for such studies before he went to 
London. As soon as he began to write plays, he 
had new motives for study; for the subjects of 
the drama in vogue were often taken from classic 
story. 

But Shakespeare had access to another source 
of knowledge besides the study of books. When 
he reached London, five or six play-houses were in 



44 DID SHAKESPEABE WRITE BACON'S WOBKS 

full activity, and new plays were produced every 
year in vast numbers. New plays were then in 
constant demand, just as the new novel and new 
daily or weekly paper are called for now. The 
drama was the periodical literature of the time. 
Dramatic authors wrote with wonderful rapidity, 
borrowing their subjects from plays already on the 
stage, and from classic or recent history. Mar- 
lowe, Greene, Lyly, Peele, Kyd, Lodge, Nash, 
Chettle, Munday, Wilson, were all dramatic writers 
before Shakespeare. Philip Henslowe, a manager 
or proprietor of the theatres, bought two hundred 
and seventy plays in about ten years. Thomas 
Heywood wrote a part or the whole of two hun- 
dred and twenty plays during his dramatic career. 
Each acted play furnished material for some other. 
They were the property of the play-houses, not of 
the writers. One writer after another has accused 
Shakespeare of indifference to his reputation, be- 
cause he did not publish a complete and revised 
edition of his works during his life. How could 
he do this, since they did not belong to him, but 
to the theatre ? Yet every writer was at full liberty 
to make use of all he could remember of other 
plays, as he saw them acted ; and Shakespeare 
was not slow to use this opportunity. No doubt 
he gained knowledge in this way, which he after- 
ward employed much better than did the authors 
from whom he took it. 

The first plays printed under Shakespeare's 



BIB SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WORKS 45 

name did not appear till he had been connected 
with the stage eleven years. This gives time 
enough for him to have acquired all the knowledge 
to be found in his books. That he had read Latin 
and Greek books we are told by Ben Jonson ; 
though that great scholar undervalued, as was 
natural, Shakespeare's attainments in those lan- 
guages. 

But Ben Jonson himself furnishes the best re- 
ply to those who think that Shakespeare could not 
have gained much knowledge of science or litera- 
ture because he did not go to Oxford or Cam- 
bridge. What opportunities had Ben Jonson? 
A bricklayer by trade, called back immediately 
from his studies to use the trowel ; then running 
away and enlisting as a common soldier ; fighting 
in the Low Countries ; coming home at nineteen, 
and going on the stage ; sent to prison for fighting 
a duel — what opportunities for study had he ? 
He was of a strong animal nature, combative, in 
perpetual quarrels, fond of drink, in pecuniary 
troubles, married at tw;enty, with a wife and chil- 
dren to support. Yet Jonson was celebrated for 
his learning. He was master of Greek and Latin 
literature. He took his characters from Athenseus, 
Libanius, Philostratus. Somehow he had found 
time for all this study. " Greek and Latin thought," 
says Taine, " were incorporated with his own, and 
made a part of it. He knew alchemy, and was as 
familiar with alembics, retorts, crucibles, etc., as if 



46 BIB SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WORKS 

he had passed his life in seeking the philosopher's 
stone. He seems to have had a specialty in every 
branch of knowledge. He had all the methods 
of Latin art, — possessed the brilliant conciseness 
of Seneca and Lucan." If Ben Jonson — a brick- 
layer, a soldier, a fighter, a drinker — could yet find 
time to acquire this vast knowledge, is there any 
reason why Shakespeare, with much more leisure, 
might not have done the like ? He did not possess 
as much Greek and Latin lore as Ben Jonson, 
who, probably, had Shakespeare in his mind when 
he wrote the following passage in his " Poetaster : " 

" His learning" savors not the school-like gloss 
That most consists in echoing words and terms, 
And soonest wins a man an empty name ; 
Nor any long or far-fetched circumstance 
Wrapt in the curious generalties of art — 
But a direct and analytic sum 
Of all the worth and first effects of art. 
And for his poesy, 't is so rammed with life, 
That it shall gather strength of life with being, 
And live hereafter more admired than now." 

The only other serious proof offered in support 
of the proposition that Bacon wrote the immortal 
Shakespearean drama is that certain coincidences 
of thought and language are found in the works of 
the two writers. When we examine them, how- 
ever, they seem very insignificant. Take, as an 
example, two or three, on which Judge Holmes 
relies, and which he thinks very striking. 

Holmes says (page 48) that Bacon quotes Aris- 



DIB SHAKESPEARE WEITE BACON'S WORKS 47 

totle, who said that " young men were no fit hear- 
ers of moral philosophy," and Shakespeare says 
(" Troilus and Cressida ") : — 

" Unlike young men whom Aristotle thought 
Unfit to hear moral philosophy." 

But since Bacon's remark was published in 1605, 
and " Troilus and Cressida " did not appear until 
1609, Shakespeare might have seen it there, and 
introduced it into his play from his recollection of 
the passage in the "Advancement of Learning." 

Another coincidence mentioned by Holmes is 
that both writers use the word " thrust : " Bacon 
saying that a ship " thrust into Weymouth ; " and 
Shakespeare, that " Milan was thrust from Milan." 
He also thinks it cannot be an accident that both 
frequently use the word " wilderness," though in 
very different ways. Both also compare Queen 
Elizabeth to a " star." Bacon makes Atlantis an 
island in mid-ocean ; and the island of Prospero is 
also in mid-ocean. Both have a good deal to say 
about " mirrors," and " props," and like phrases. 

Such reasoning as this has very little weight. 
You cannot prove two contemporaneous writings 
to have proceeded from one author by the same 
words and phrases being found in both ; for these 
are in the vocabulary of the time, and are the com- 
mon property of all who read and write. 

My position is that if either of these writers 
wrote the works attributed to the other, it is much 



48 DID SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WORKS 

more likely that Shakespeare wrote the philosophi- 
cal works of Bacon than that Bacon wrote the 
poetical works of Shakespeare. Assuming then, 
as we have a right to do in this argument, that 
Shakespeare wrote the plays, what reasons are there 
for believing that he also wrote the philosophy? 

First, this assumption will explain at once that 
hitherto insoluble problem of the contradiction 
between Bacon's character and conduct and his 
works. How could he have been, at the same 
time, what Pope calls him, — 

" The wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind " ? 

He was, in his philosophy, the leader of his age, 
the reformer of old abuses, the friend of progress. 
In his conduct, he was, as Macaulay has shown, 
" far behind his age, — far behind Sir Edward 
Coke ; clinging to exploded abuses, withstanding 
the progress of improvement, struggling to push 
back the human mind." In his writings, he was 
calm, dignified, noble. In his life, he was an 
office-seeker through long years, seeking place by 
cringing subservience to men in power, made 
wretched to the last degree when office was denied 
him, addressing servile supplications to noblemen 
and to the sovereign. To gain and keep office he 
would desert his friends, attack his benefactors, 
and make abject apologies for any manly word he 
might have incautiously uttered. His philosophy 
rose far above earth and time, and sailed supreme 



BID SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WORKS 49 

in the air of universal reason. But " his desires 
were set on things below. Wealth, precedence, 
titles, patronage, the mace, the seals, the coronet, 
large houses, fair gardens, rich manors, massy ser- 
vices of plate, gay hangings," were " objects for 
which he stooped to everything and endured every^ 
thing." These words of Macaulay have been 
thought too severe. But we defy any admirer of 
Bacon to read his life, by Spedding, without admit- 
ting their essential truth. How was it possible 
for a man to spend half of his life in the meanest 
of pursuits, and the other half in the noblest ? 

This difficulty is removed if we suppose that 
Bacon, the courtier and lawyer, with his other 
ambitions, was desirous of the fame of a great phi- 
losopher ; and that he induced Shakespeare, then 
in the prime of his powers, to help him write the 
prose essays and treatises which are his chief 
works. He has himself admitted that he did actu- 
ally ask the aid of the dramatists of his time in 
writing his books. This remarkable fact is stated 
by Bacon in a letter to Tobie Matthew, written in 
June, 1623, in which he says that he is devoting 
himself to making his writings more perfect — 
instancing the " Essays " and the " Advancement 
of Learning " — " by the help of some good pens, 
which forsake me not." One of these pens was 
that of Ben Jonson, the other might easily have 
been that of Shakespeare. Certainly there was no 
better pen in England at that time than his. 



50 BIB SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WORKS 

When Shakespeare's plays were being produced, 
Lord Bacon was fully occupied in his law practice, 
his parliamentary duties, and his office-seeking. 
The largest part of the Shakespeare drama was put 
on the stage, as modern research renders probable, 
in the ten or twelve years beginning with 1590. In 
1597 Shakespeare was rich enough to buy the new 
place at Stratford-on-Avon, and was also lending 
money. In 1604 he was part owner of the Globe 
Theatre, so that the majority of the plays which 
gained for him this fortune must have been pro- 
duced before that time. Now, these were just the 
busiest years of Bacon's life. In 1584 he was 
elected to Parliament. About the same time, he 
wrote his famous letter to Queen Elizabeth. In 
1585 he was already seeking office from Walsing- 
ham and Burleigh. In 1586 he sat in Parliament 
for Taunton, and was active in debate and on com- 
mittees. He became a bencher in the same year, 
and began to plead in the courts of Westminster. 
In 1589 he became queen's counsel, and member 
of Parliament for Liverpool. After this he con- 
tinued active, both in Parliament and at the bar. 
He sought, by the help of Essex, to become Attor- 
ney-General. From that period, as crown lawyer, 
his whole time and thought were required to trace 
and frustrate the conspiracies with which the king- 
dom was full. It was evident that during these 
years he had no time to compose fifteen or twenty 
of the greatest works in any literature. 



DIB SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WORKS 51 

But how was Shakespeare occupied when Bacon's 
philosophy appeared ? The " Advancement of 
Learning " was published in 1605, after most of 
the plays had been written, as we learn from the 
fact of Shakespeare's purchase of houses and 
lands. The " Novum Organum " was published in 
1620, after Shakespeare's death. But it had been 
written years before ; revised, altered, and copied 
again and again — it is said twelve times. Bacon 
had been engaged upon it during thirty years, and 
it was at last published incomplete and in frag- 
ments. If Shakespeare assisted in the composi- 
tion of this work, his death in 1616 would account, 
at once, for its being left unfinished. And Shake- 
speare would have had ample time to furnish the 
ideas of the " Organum " in the last years of his 
life, when he had left the theatre. In 1613 he 
bought a house in Black Friars, where Ben Jonson 
also lived. Might not this have been that they 
might more conveniently cooperate in assisting 
Bacon to write the " Novum Organum " ? 

When we ask whether it would have been easier 
for the author of the philosophy to have composed 
the drama, or the dramatic poet to have written 
the philosophy, the answer will depend on which 
is the greater work of the two. The greater in- 
cludes the less, but the less cannot include the 
greater. Now, the universal testimony of modern 
criticism in England, Germany, and France de- 
clares that no larger, deeper, or ampler intellect 



52 BID SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WORKS 

has ever appeared than that which produced the 
Shakespeare drama. This " myriad-minded " poet 
was also philosopher, man of the world, acquainted 
with practical affairs, one of those who saw the 
present and foresaw the future. All the ideas of 
the Baconian philosophy might easily have had 
their home in this vast intelligence. Great as 
are the thoughts of the " Novum Organum," they 
are far inferior to that world of thought which is 
in the drama. We can easily conceive that Shake- 
speare, having produced in his prime the wonders 
and glories of the plays, should in his after leisure 
have developed the leading ideas of the Baconian 
philosophy. But it is difficult to imagine that 
Bacon, while devoting his main strength to poli- 
tics, to law, and to philosophy, should as a mere 
pastime for his leisure, have produced in his idle 
moments the greatest intellectual work ever done 
on earth. 

If the greater includes the less, the mind of 
Shakespeare includes that of Bacon, and not vice 
versa. This will appear more plainly if we con- 
sider the quality of intellect displayed respectively 
in the dramas and the philosophy. The one is 
synthetic, creative ; the other analytic, critical. 
The one puts together, the other takes apart and 
examines. Now, the genius which can put to- 
gether can also take apart ; but it by no means 
follows that the power of taking apart implies that 
of putting together. A watch-maker, who can put 



BIB SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WORKS 53 

a watch together, can easily take it to pieces ; but 
many a child who has taken his watch to pieces 
has found it impossible to put it together again. 

When we compare the Shakespeare plays and 
the Baconian philosophy, it is curious to see how 
the one is throughout a display of the synthetic 
intellect, and the other of the analytic. The plays 
are pure creation, the production of living wholes. 
They people our thought with a race of beings 
who are living persons, and not pale abstractions. 
These airy nothings take flesh and form, and have 
a name and local habitation forever on the earth. 
Hamlet, Desdemona, Othello, Miranda, are as real 
people as Queen Elizabeth or Mary of Scotland. 
But when we turn to the Baconian philosophy, this 
faculty is absent. We have entered the laboratory 
of a great chemist, and are surrounded by retorts 
and crucibles, tests and re-agents, where the work 
done is a careful analysis of all existing things, to 
find what are their constituents and their qualities. 
Poetry creates, philosophy takes to pieces and ex- 
amines. 

It is, I think, a historic fact, that while those 
authors whose primary quality is poetic genius 
have often been also, on a lower plane, eminent 
as philosophers, there is, perhaps, not a single 
instance of one whose primary distinction was, 
philosophic analysis, who has also been, on a 
lower plane, eminent as a poet. Milton, Petrarch, 
Goethe, Lucretius, Voltaire, Coleridge, were pri- 



54 BIB SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WORKS 

marily and eminently poets ; but all excelled, too, 
in a less degree, as logicians, metaphysicians, men 
of science, and philosophers. But what instance 
have we of any man like Bacon, chiefly eminent 
as lawyer, statesman, and philosopher, who was 
also distinguished, though in a less degree, as a 
poet ? Among great lawyers, is there one eminent 
also as a dramatic or lyric author ? Cicero tried 
it, but his verses are only doggerel. In Lord 
Campbell's list of the lord chancellors and chief 
justices of England no such instance appears. If 
Bacon wrote the Shakespeare drama, he is the one 
exception to an otherwise universal rule. But if 
Shakespeare cooperated in the production of the 
Baconian philosophy, he belongs to a class of poets 
who have done the same. Coleridge was one of 
the most imaginative of poets. His " Christabel " 
and " Ancient Mariner " are pure creations. But 
in later life he originated a new system of philoso- 
phy in England, the influence of which has not 
ceased to be felt to our day. The case would be 
exactly similar if we suppose that Shakespeare, 
having ranged the realm of imaginative poetry in 
his youth, had in his later days of leisure coop- 
erated with Bacon and Ben Jonson in producing 
the " Advancement of Learning " and the " No- 
vum Organum." We can easily think of them 
as meeting, sometimes at the house of Ben Jonson, 
sometimes at that of Shakespeare in Black Friars, 
and sometimes guests at that private house built 



BIB SHAKESPEARE WHITE BACON'S WORKS 55 

by Lord Bacon for purposes of study, near his 
splendid palace of Gorhambury. " A most in- 
geniously contrived house," says Basil Montagu, 
"where, in the society of his philosophical friends, 
he devoted himself to study and meditation." 
Aubrey tells us that he had the aid of Hobbes in 
writing down his thoughts. Lord Bacon appears to 
have possessed the happy gift of using other men's 
faculties in his service. Ben Jonson, who had 
been a thorough student of chemistry, alchemy, 
and science in all the forms then known, aided 
Bacon in his observations of nature. Hobbes 
aided him in giving clearness to his thoughts 
and his language. And from Shakespeare he may 
have derived the radical and central ideas of his 
philosophy. He used the help of Dr. Playfer to 
translate his philosophy into Latin. Tobie Mat- 
thew gives him the last argument of Galileo for 
the Copernican system. He sends his works to 
others, begging them to correct the thoughts and 
the style. It is evident, then, that he would have 
been glad of the concurrence of Shakespeare, and 
that could easily be had, through their common 
friend, Ben Jonson. 

If Bacon wrote the plays of Shakespeare, it is 
difficult to give any satisfactory reason for his con- 
cealment of that authorship. He had much pride, 
not to say vanity, in being known as an author. 
He had his name attached to all his other works, 
and sent them as presents to the universities, and 



56 DID SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON'S WORKS 

to individuals, with letters calling their attention 
to these books. Would he have been willing per- 
manently to conceal the fact of his being the author 
of the best poetry of his time ? The reasons as- 
signed by Judge Holmes for this are not satisfac- 
tory. They are : his desire to rise in the profession 
of the law, the low reputation of a play-writer, his 
wish to write more freely under an incognito, and 
his wish to rest his reputation on his philosophical 
works. But if he were reluctant to be regarded 
as the author of " Lear " and " Hamlet," he was 
willing to be known as the writer of " Masques," 
and a play about " Arthur," exhibited by the stu- 
dents of Gray's Inn. It is an error to say that 
the reputation of a play-writer was low. Judge 
Holmes, himself, tells us that there was nothing 
remarkable in a barrister of the inns of court writ- 
ing for the stage. Ford and Beaumont were both 
lawyers as well as eminent play-writers. Lord 
Backhurst, Lord Brooke, Sir Henry Wotton, all 
wrote plays. And we find nothing in the Shake- 
speare dramas which Bacon need have feared to 
say under his own name. It would have been 
ruin to Sir Philip Francis to have avowed himself 
the author of " Junius." But the Shakespeare 
plays satirized no one, and made no enemies. If 
there were any reasons for concealment, they cer- 
tainly do not apply to the year 1628, when the 
first folio appeared, which was after the death 
of Shakespeare and the fall of Bacon. The ac- 



DIB SHAKESPEABE WRITE BACON'S WOBKS 57 

knowledgment of their authorship at that time 
could no longer interfere with Bacon's rise. And 
it would be very little to the credit of his intelli- 
gence to assume that he was not then aware of the 
value of such works, or that he did not desire 
the reputation of being their author. It would 
have been contrary to his very nature not to have 
wished for the credit of that authorship. 

On the other hand, there would be nothing 
surprising in the fact of Shakespeare's laying no 
claim to credit for having assisted in the composi- 
tion of the " Advancement of Learning." Shake- 
speare was by nature as reticent and modest as 
Bacon was egotistical and ostentatious. What 
a veil is drawn over the poet's personality in his 
sonnets ! We read in them his inmost sentiments, 
but they tell us absolutely nothing of the events of 
his life, or the facts of his position. And if, as 
we assume, he was one among several who helped 
Lord Bacon, though he might have done the most, 
there was no special reason why he should proclaim 
that fact. 

Gervinus has shown, in three striking pages, the 
fundamental harmony between the ideas and men- 
tal tendencies of Shakespeare and Bacon. Their 
philosophy of man and of life was the same. If, 
then, Bacon needed to be helped in thinking out 
his system, there was no one alive who would have 
given him such stimulus and encouragement as 
Shakespeare. This also may explain his not men- 



58 BIB SHAEESPEABE WRITE BACON'S WOBKS 

tioning the name of Shakespeare in his works ; 
for that might have called too much attention to 
the source from which he received this important 
aid. 

Nevertheless, I regard the monistic theory as in 
the last degree improbable. We have two great 
authors, and not one only. But if we are com- 
pelled to accept the view which ascribes a common 
source to the Shakespeare drama and the Baconian 
philosophy, I think there are good reasons for 
preferring Shakespeare to Bacon as the author 
of both. When the plays appeared, Bacon was 
absorbed in pursuits and ambitions foreign to such 
work ; his accepted writings show no sign of such 
creative power ; he was the last man in the world 
not to take the credit of such a success, and had 
no motive to conceal his authorship. On the other 
hand, there was a period in Shakespeare's life 
when he had abundant leisure to cooperate in the 
literary plans of Bacon ; his ample intellect was 
full of the ideas which took form in those works ; 
and he was just the person neither to claim nor to 
desi/e any credit for lending such assistance. 

There is, certainly, every reason to believe that, 
among his other ambitions, Bacon desired that of 
striking out a new path of discovery, and initiat- 
ing a better method in the study of nature. But 
we know that, in doing this, he sought aid in 
all quarters, and especially among Shakespeare's 
friends and companions. It is highly probable, 



BIB SHAKESPEARE WEITE BACON'S WORKS 59 

therefore, that lie became acquainted with the 
great dramatist, and that Shakespeare knew of 
Bacon's designs and became interested in them. 
And if so, who could offer better suggestions than 
he ; and who would more willingly accept them 
than the overworked statesman and lawyer, who 
wished to be also a philosopher ? 

Finally, we may refer those who believe that the 
shape of the brow and head indicates the quality 
of mental power to the portraits of the two men. 
The head of Shakespeare, according to all the 
busts and pictures which remain to us, belongs 
to the type which antiquity has transmitted to us 
in the portraits of Homer and Plato. In this vast 
dome of thought there was room for everything. 
The head of Bacon is also a grand one, but less 
ample, less complete — less 

* ' Teres, totus atque rotundus." 

These portraits therefore agree with all we know 
of the writings, in showing us which, and which 
only, of the two minds was capable of containing 
the other. 



THE EVOLUTION OF A GREAT POEM 1 

There are at least three existing manuscripts 
of Gray's "Elegy," in the author's autograph. 
The earliest, containing the largest number of 
variations and the most curious, is that now in the 
possession of Sir William Eraser in London, and 
for which he paid the large sum of £230, in 1875. 
By the kindness of Sir William Fraser, I examined 
this manuscript at his rooms in London, in 1882. 
A facsimile copy of this valuable autograph, pho- 
tographed from the original in 1862, is now before 
me. A second copy in the handwriting of Gray, 
called the Pembroke manuscript, is in the library 
of Pembroke Hall, Cambridge. A facsimile of 
this autograph appears in Matthias's edition of 
Mason's "Gray," published in 1814. A third 
copy, in the poet's handwriting, copied by him for 
his friend, Dr. Wharton, is in the British Museum. 
I examined this, also, in 1882, and had an ac- 
curate copy made for me by one of the assistants 
in the museum/ This was written after the other 
two, as is evident from the fact that it approaches 
most nearly to the form which the " Elegy " finally 
assumed when printed. There are only nine or 
1 The Independent, 1882. 



THE EVOLUTION OF A GREAT POEM 61 

ten expressions in this manuscript which differ 
from the poem as published by Gray. Most of 
these are unimportant. " Or " he changed, in 
three places, into " and." " And in our ashes " 
he changed into " Even in our ashes," which was 
a clear improvement. It was not until after this 
third copy was written that the improvement was 
made which changed 



into 



"Forgive, ye Proud, the involuntary Fault, 
If Memory to These no Trophies raise," 

" Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault, 
If Memory o'er their tomb no trophies raise." 



Another important alteration of a single word was 
also made after this third manuscript was written. 
This was the change, in the forty-fifth stanza, of 
" Eeins of Empire " into " Rod of Empire." 

" The Elegy in a Country Churchyard " became 
at once one of the most popular poems in the 
language, and has remained so to this time. It 
has. been equally a favorite with common readers, 
with literary men, and with poets. Its place will 
always be in the highest rank of English poetry. 
The fact, however, is — and it is a very curious 
fact — that this first-class poem was the work of a 
third-class poet. For Thomas Gray certainly does 
not stand in the first class with Shakespeare, 
Spenser, and Milton. Nor can he fairly be put in 
the second class with Dryden, Pope, Burns, Words- 
worth, and Byron. He belongs to the third, with 



62 THE EVOLUTION OF A GBEAT POEM 

Cowley, Cowper, Shelley, and Keats. There may 
be a doubt concerning some of whom I have 
named, but there can be no doubt that Gray will 
never stand higher than those who may be placed 
by critics in the third class. Yet it is equally 
certain that he has produced a first-class poem. 
How is this paradox to be explained ? 

What is the charm of Gray's " Elegy " ? The 
thoughts are sufficiently commonplace. That all 
men must die, that the most humble may have had 
in them some power which, under other circum- 
stances, might have made them famous, — these 
are somewhat trite statements ; but the fascination 
of the verses consists in the tone, solemn but 
serene, which pervades them ; in the pictures of 
coming night, of breaking day, of cheerful rural 
life, of happy homes ; and lastly, in the perfect 
finish of the verse and the curious felicity of the 
diction. In short, the poem is a work of high art. 
It was not inspired, but it was carefully elabo- 
rated. And this appears plainly when we com- 
pare it, as it stands in the Fraser manuscript, with 
its final form. 

This poem was .a work of eight years. Its head- 
ing in the Fraser manuscript is " Stanzas Wrote 
in a Country Churchyard." It was, however, be- 
gun at Stoke in 1742, continued at Cambridge, 
and had its last touches added at Stoke-Pogis, 
June 12, 1750. In a letter to Horace Walpole of 
that date, Gray says, " Having put an end to a 



THE EVOLUTION OF A GREAT POEM 63 

thing whose beginning you saw long ago, I im- 
mediately send it to you." 

The corrections made by Gray during this 
period were many, and were probably all improve- 
ments. Many poets when they try to improve 
their verses only injure them. But Gray's correc- 
tions were invariably for the better. We may 
even say that, if it had been published as it was 
first written, and as it now stands in the Fraser 
manuscript, it would have ranked only with the 
best poetry of Shenstone or Cowper. Let me 
indicate some of the most important changes. 

In line seventeen, the fine epithet of " incense- 
breathing " was an addition. 

" The breezy call of incense-breathing morn," 

for the Fraser manuscript reads — 

" Forever sleep. The breezy call of morn." 

Nineteenth line, Fraser manuscript has — 

il Or chanticleer so shrill, or echoing horn," 

corrected to 

" The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn." 

Twenty-fourth — " Coming kiss " was corrected 
to " envied kiss." 

Forty -third — "Awake the silent dust" was 
corrected to " provoke the silent dust." 

Forty-seventh — The correction of " Reins of 
Empire " to " Rod of Empire " first appears in 
the margin of the Pembroke manuscript. 



64 THE EVOLUTION OF A GREAT POEM 

Fifty - seventh — In the Eraser manuscript it 
reads — 

" Some village Cato, who with dauntless breast, 
Some mute, inglorious Tully here may rest ; 
Some Caesar," etc. 

In the Pembroke manuscript, these classical per- 
sonages have disappeared, and the great improve- 
ment was made of substituting Hampden, Milton, 
and Cromwell, and thus maintaining the English 
coloring of the poem. 

Fifty-first — This verse, beginning, " But Know- 
ledge," etc., was placed, in the Fraser manuscript, 
after the one beginning, " Some village Cato," but 
with a note in the margin to transfer it to where 
it now stands. The third line of the stanza was 
first written, " Chill Penury had damped." This 
was first corrected to " depressed," and afterward 
to " repressed." 

Fifty-fifth — "Their fate forbade," changed to 
"Their lot forbade." 

Sixty-sixth — " Their struggling virtues " was 
improved to " Their growing virtues." 

Seventy-first — " Crown the shrine " was altered 
to " heap the shrine," and in the next line " In- 
cense hallowed by the muse's flame " was wisely 
changed to " Incense kindled by the muse's flame." 

After the seventy-second line stand, in the 
Fraser manuscript, the following stanzas, which 
Gray, with admirable taste, afterward omitted. 
But, before he decided to leave them out alto- 



THE EVOLUTION OF A GREAT POEM 65 

gether, he drew a black line down the margin, 
indicating that he would transfer them to another 
place. These stanzas were originally intended to 
close the poem. Afterward the thought occurred 
to him of " the hoary-headed swain " and the 
" Epitaph." 

" The thoughtless World to Majesty may bow, 
Exalt the Brave and idolize Success, 
But more to Innocence their safety owe 

Than Power and Genius e'er conspire to bless. 

" And thou, who, mindful of the unhonored Dead, 
Dost, in these Notes, their artless Tale relate, 
By Night and lonely Contemplation led 
To linger in the gloomy Walks of Fate ; 

"Hark, how the sacred Calm that broods around 
Bids every fierce, tumultuous Passion cease, 
In still, small Accents whispering from the Ground 
A grateful Earnest of eternal Peace. 

" No more with Reason and thyself at Strife, 
Give anxious Cares and useless Wishes room ; 
But through the cool, sequestered Vale of Life 
Pursue the silent Tenor of thy Doom." 

After these stanzas, according to the Fraser 
manuscript, were to follow these lines, which I do 
not remember to have seen elsewhere : — 

" If chance that e'er some pensive Spirit more, 
By sympathetic Musings here delayed, 
With vain though kind Enquiry shall explore 

Thy once-loved Haunt, thy long-neglected Shade, 

"Haply," etc. 

But Gray soon dispensed with this feeble stanza, 



66 THE EVOLUTION OF A GBEAT POEM 

and made a new one by changing it into the one 
beginning : — 

" For thee, who mindful." 

The ninety-ninth and one hundredth lines stand in 
the Fraser manuscript — 

" With hasty footsteps brush the dews away 
On the high brow of yonder hanging* lawn." 

The following stanza is noticeable for the in- 
versions so frequent in Gray, and which he had, 
perhaps, unconsciously adopted from his familiarity 
with the classics. He afterward omitted it : — 

" Him have we seen the greenwood side along, 

While o'er the heath we hied, our labors done. 
Oft as the wood-lark piped her farewell song, 
With wistful eyes pursue the setting sun." 

In the manuscript the word is spelled " whistf ul." 
In line 101, " hoary beech " is corrected to " spread- 
ing beech," and afterward to " nodding beech." 

Line 113 — " Dirges meet " was changed to 
" dirges dire ; " and after 116 came the beautiful 
stanza, afterward omitted by Gray as being de trop 
in this place : — 

" There, scattered oft, the earliest of the year, 

By hands unseen, are showers of violets found ; 
The redbreast loves to build and warble there, 
And little footsteps lightly print the ground.'' 

Even in this verse there were two corrections. 
" Eobin " was altered in the Fraser manuscript 
into " redbreast," and " frequent violets " into 
" showers of violets." 



THE EVOLUTION OF A GBEAT POEM 67 

One of the most curious accidents to which this 
famous poem has been subjected was an erroneous 
change made in the early editions, which has been 
propagated almost to our time. In the stanza be- 
ginning — 

" The boast of Heraldry, the pomp of Power," 

Gray wrote 

" Awaits alike the inevitable Hour." 

And so it stands in all three manuscripts, and in 
the printed edition which he himself superintended. 
His meaning was, " The inevitable Hour awaits 
everything. It stands there, waiting the boast 
of Heraldry," etc. But his editors, misled by his 
inverted style, supposed that it was the gifts of 
Heraldry, Power, Beauty, etc., that were* waiting, 
and therefore corrected what they thought Gray's 
bad grammar, and printed the word " await." But 
so they destroyed the meaning. These things were 
not waiting at all for the dread hour ; they were 
enjoying themselves, careless of its approach. 
But " the hour " was waiting for them. Gray's 
original reading has been restored in the last 
editions. 

In tracing the development of this fine poem, we 
see it gradually improving under his careful touch, 
till it becomes a work of high art. In some poets 
— Wordsworth, for example — inspiration is at 
its maximum, and art at its minimum. In Gray, 
I think, inspiration was at its minimum, and art at 
its maximum. 



EELIGIOUS AND PHILOSOPH- 
ICAL 



AFFINITIES OF BUDDHISM AND CHRIS- 
TIANITY x 

It has long been known that many analogies 
exist between Buddhism and Christianity. The 
ceremonies, ritual, and rites of the Buddhists strik- 
ingly resemble those of the Roman Catholic Church. 
The Buddhist priests are monks. They take the 
same three vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience 
which are binding on those of the Roman Church. 
They are mendicants, like the mendicant orders of 
St. Francis and St. Dominic. They are tonsured ; 
use strings of beads, like the rosary, with which to 
count their prayers ; have incense and candles in 
their worship ; use fasts, processions, litanies, and 
holy water. They have something akin to the 
adoration of saints ; repeat prayers in an unknown 
tongue; have a chanted psalmody with a double 
choir ; and suspend the censer from five chains. 
In China, some Buddhists worship the image of a 
virgin, called the Queen of Heaven, having an 
infant in her arms, and holding a cross. In Thibet 
the Grand Lamas wear a mitre, dalmatica, and 
cope, and pronounce a benediction on the laity by 
extending the right hand over their heads. The 

1 The North American Beview, May, 1883. 



72 BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 

Dalai-Lama resembles the Pope, and is regarded 
as the head of the Church. The worship of relics 
is very ancient among the Buddhists, and so are 
pilgrimages to sacred places. 

Besides these resemblances in outward ceremo- 
nies, more important ones appear in the inner life 
and history of the two religions. Both belong to 
those systems which derive their character from a 
human founder, and not from a national tendency ; 
to the class which contains the religions of Moses, 
Zoroaster, Confucius, and Mohammed, and not to 
that in which the Brahmanical, Egyptian, Scandi- 
navian, Greek, and Roman religions are found. 
Both Buddhism and Christianity are catholic, and 
not ethnic ; that is, not confined to a single race 
or nation, but by their missionary spirit passing 
beyond these boundaries, and making converts 
among many races. Christianity began among the 
Jews as a Semitic religion, but, being rejected by 
the Jewish nation, established itself among the 
Aryan races of Europe. In the same way Bud- 
dhism, beginning among an Aryan people — the 
Hindoos — was expelled from Hindostan, and es- 
tablished itself among the Mongol races of Eastern 
Asia. Besides its resemblances to the Roman 
Catholic side of Christendom, Buddhism has still 
closer analogies with the Protestant Church. Like 
Protestantism, it is a reform, which rejects a hie- 
rarchal system and does away with a priestly caste. 
Like Protestantism, it has emphasized the purely 



BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 73 

humane side of life, and is a religion of humanity 
rather than of piety. Both the Christian and Bud- 
dhist churches teach a divine incarnation, and both 
worship a God-man. 

Are these remarkable analogies only casual re- 
semblances, or are they real affinities ? By affinity 
we here mean genetic relationship. Are Buddhism 
and Christianity related as mother and child, one 
being derived from the other ; or are they related by 
both being derived from some common ancestor ? Is 
either derived from the other, as Christianity from 
Judaism, or Protestantism from the Papal Church ? 
That there can be no such affinity as this seems 
evident from history. History shows no trace of 
the contact which would be required for such influ- 
ence. If Christianity had taken its customs from 
Buddhism, or Buddhism from Christianity, there 
must have been ample historic evidence of the fact. 
But, instead of this, history shows that each has 
grown up by its own natural development, and has 
unfolded its qualities separately and alone. The 
law of evolution also teaches that such great systems 
do not come from imitation, but as growths from a 
primal germ. 

Nor does history give the least evidence of a com- 
mon ancestry from which both took their common 
traits. We know that Buddhism was derived from 
Brahmanism, and that Christianity was derived 
from Judaism. Now, Judaism and Brahmanism 
have few analogies ; they could not, therefore, have 



74 BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 

transmitted to their offspring what they did not 
themselves possess. Brahmanism came from an 
Aryan stock, in Central Asia ; Judaism from a 
Semitic stem, thousands of miles to the west. If 
Buddhism and Christianity came from a common 
source, that source must have antedated both the 
Mosaic and Brahmanical systems. Even then it 
would be a case of atavism in which the original 
type disappeared in the children, to reappear in the 
later descendants. 

Are, then, these striking resemblances, and oth- 
ers which are still to be mentioned, only accidental 
analogies ? This does not necessarily follow ; for 
there is a third alternative. They may be what 
are called in science homologies ; that is, the same 
law working out similar results under the same 
conditions, though under different circumstances. 
The whale lives under different circumstances from 
other mammalia; but being a mammal, he has a 
like osseous structure. What seems to be a fin, 
being dissected, turns out to be an arm, with hand 
and fingers. There are like homologies in history. 
Take the instance of the English and French re- 
volutions. In each case the legitimate king was 
tried, condemned, and executed. A republic fol- 
lowed. The republic gave way before a strong- 
handed usurper. Then the original race of kings 
was restored ; but, having learned nothing and for- 
gotten nothing, they were displaced a second time, 
and a constitutional monarch placed on the throne, 



BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 75 

who, though not the legitimate king, still belonged 
to the same race. Here the same laws of human 
nature have worked out similar results ; for no one 
would suggest that France had copied its revolu- 
tions from England. And, in religion, human na- 
ture reproduces similar customs and ceremonies 
under like conditions. When, for instance, you 
have a mechanical system of prayer, in which the 
number of prayers is of chief importance, there 
must be some way of counting them, and so the 
rosary has been invented independently in differ- 
ent religions. We have no room to point out how 
this law has worked in other instances ; but it is 
enough to refer to the principle. 

Besides these resemblances between Buddhism 
and Christianity, there are also some equally re- 
markable differences, which should be noticed. 

The first of these is the striking fact that Bud- 
dhism has been unable to recognize the existence of 
the Infinite Being. It has been called atheism by 
the majority of the best authorities. Even Arthur 
Lillie, who defends this system from the charge of 
agnosticism, says : 1 " An agnostic school of Bud- 
dhism without doubt exists. It professes plain athe- 
ism, and holds that every mortal, when he escapes 
from re-births, and the causation of Karma by the 
awakenment of the Bodhi or gnosis, will be anni- 
hilated. This Buddhism, by Eugene Burnouf, 
Saint-Hilaire, Max Muller, Csoma de Koros, and, 

1 Buddha and Early Buddhism. Trubner & Co., 1881. 



76 BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 

I believe, almost every writer of note, is pro- 
nounced the original Buddhism, — the Buddhism 
of the South." Almost every writer of note, 
therefore, who has studied Buddhism in the Pali, 
Singhalese, Chinese, and other languages, and has 
had direct access to its original sources, has pro- 
nounced it a system of atheism. But this opinion 
is opposed to the fact that Buddhists have every- 
where worshiped unseen and superhuman powers, 
erected magnificent temples, maintained an elabo- 
rate ritual, and adored Buddha as the supreme 
ruler of the worlds. How shall we explain this 
paradox ? All depends on the definition we give 
to the word "atheism." If a system is atheistic 
which sees only the temporal, and not the eternal ; 
which knows no God as the author, creator, and 
ruler of Nature ; which ascribes the origin of the 
universe to natural causes, to which only the finite 
is knowable, and the infinite unknowable — -then 
Buddhism is atheism. But, in that case, much 
of the polytheism of the world must be regarded 
as atheism ; for polytheism has largely worshiped 
finite gods. The whole race of Olympian deities 
were finite beings. Above them ruled the ever- 
lasting necessity of things. But who calls the 
Greek worshipers atheists ? The Buddha, to most 
Buddhists, is a finite being, one who has passed 
through numerous births, has reached Nirvana, and 
will one day be superseded by another Buddha. 
Yet, for the time, he is the Supreme Being, Ruler 



BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 77 

of all the Worlds. He is the object of worship, 
and really divine, if in a subordinate sense. 

I would not, therefore, call this religion atheism. 
No, religion which worships superhuman powers 
can justly be called atheistic on account of its 
meagre metaphysics. How many Christians there 
are who do not fully realize the infinite and eternal 
nature of the Deity ! To many He is no more than 
the Buddha is to his worshipers, — a supreme be- 
ing, a mighty ruler, governing all things by his 
will. How few see God everywhere in nature, as 
Jesus saw Him, letting his sun shine on the evil and 
good, and sending his rain on the just and unjust. 
How few see Him in all of life, so that not a spar- 
row dies, or a single hair of the head falls, without 
the Father. Most Christians recognize the Deity 
only as occasionally interfering by special provi- 
dences, particular judgments, and the like. 

But in Christianity this ignorance of the eternal 
nature of God is the exception, while in Buddhism 
it is the rule. In the reaction against Brahman- 
ism, the Brahmanic faith in the infinite was lost. 
In the fully developed system of the ancient Hin- 
doo religion the infinite overpowered the finite, the 
temporal world was regarded as an illusion, and 
only the eternal was real. The reaction from this 
extreme was so complete as to carry the Buddhists 
to the exact opposite. If to the Brahman all the 
finite visible world was only may a — illusion, to 
the Buddhists all the infinite unseen world was un- 
knowable, and practically nothing. 



78 BUDDHISM AXD CHE IS TI AX IT Y 

Perhaps the most original feature of Christian- 
ity is the fact that it has combined in a living syn- 
thesis that which in other systems was divided. 
Jesus regarded love to God and love to man as 
identical, — positing a harmonious whole of time 
and eternity, piety and humanity, faith and works, 
— and thus laid the foundation of a larger system 
than either Brahmanism or Buddhism. He did 
not invent piety, nor discover humanity. Long 
before he came the Brahmanic literature had 
sounded the deepest depths of spiritual life, and 
the Buddhist missionaries had preached universal 
benevolence to mankind. But the angelic hymn 
which foretold the new religion as bringing at once 
" Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, 
good will to men " indicated the essence of the 
faith which was at the same time a heavenly love 
and an earthly blessing. This difference of result 
in the two systems came probably from the differ- 
ent methods of their authors. With Jesus life was 
the source of knowledge ; the life was the light of 
men. AVith the Buddha, reflection, meditation, 
thought was the source of knowledge. In this, 
however, he included intuition no less than reflec- 
tion. Sakya-rnuni understood perfectly that a mere 
intellectual judgment possessed little motive power ; 
therefore he was not satisfied till he had obtained 
an intuitive perception of truth. That alone gave 
at once rest and power. But as the pure intel- 
lect, even in its highest act, is unable to grasp 



BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 79 

the infinite, the Buddha was an agnostic on this 
side of his creed by the very success of his method. 
Who, by searching, can find out God ? The infi- 
nite can only be known by the process of living 
experience. This was the method of Jesus, and 
has been that of his religion. For what is faith 
but that receptive state of mind which waits on 
the Lord to receive the illumination which it can- 
not create by its own processes? However this 
may be, it is probable that the fatal defect in 
Buddhism which has neutralized its generous phi- 
lanthropy and its noble humanities has been the 
absence of the inspiration which comes from the 
belief in an eternal world. Man is too great to be 
satisfied with time alone, or eternity alone : he 
needs to live from and for both. Hence, Bud- 
dhism is an arrested religion, while Christianity is 
progressive. Christianity has shown the capacity 
of outgrowing its own defects and correcting its 
own mistakes. For example, it has largely out- 
grown its habit of persecuting infidels and here- 
tics. No one is now put to death for heresy. It 
has also passed out of the stage in which religion 
is considered to consist in leaving the world and 
entering a monastery. The anchorites of the early 
centuries are no longer to be found in Christen- 
dom. Even in Catholic countries the purpose of 
monastic life is no longer to save the soul. by as- 
cetic tortures, but to attain some practical end. 
The Protestant Reformation, which broke the yoke 



80 BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 

of priestly power and set free the mind of Europe, 
was a movement originating in Christianity itself, 
like other developments of a similar kind. No 
such signs of progress exist in the system of Bud- 
dhism. It has lost the missionary ardor of its early 
years ; it has ceased from creating a vast literature 
such as grew up in its younger days ; it no longer 
produces any wonders of architecture. It even 
lags behind the active life of the countries where 
it has its greatest power. 

It is a curious analogy between the two systems 
that, while neither the Christ nor the Buddha prac- 
ticed or taught asceticism, their followers soon 
made the essence of religion to consist in some 
form of monastic life. Both Jesus and Sakya- 
muni went about doing good. Both sent their fol- 
lowers into the world to preach a gospel. Jesus, 
after thirty years of a retired life, came among 
men " eating and drinking," and associating with 
" publicans and sinners." Sakya-muni, after 
spending some years as an anchorite, deliberately 
renounced that mode of religion as unsatisfactory, 
and associated with all men, as Jesus afterward 
did. Within a few centuries after their death, 
their followers relapsed into ascetic and monastic 
practices ; but with this difference, that while in 
Christendom there has always been both a regu- 
lar and a secular clergy, in the Buddhist countries 
the whole priesthood live in monasteries. They 
have no parish priests, unless as an exception. 



BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 81 

While in Christian countries the clergy has be- 
come more and more a practical body, in sympathy 
with the common life, in Buddhist lands they live 
apart and exercise little influence on the civil con- 
dition of the people. 

Nor must we pass by the important fact that the 
word Christendom is synonymous with a progres- 
sive civilization, while Buddhism is everywhere 
connected with one which is arrested and station- 
ary. The boundaries of the Christian religion are 
exactly coextensive with the advance of science, 
art, literature ; and with the continued accumula- 
tion of knowledge, power, wealth, and the comforts 
of human life. According to Kuenen, 1 one of the 
most recent students of these questions, this differ- 
ence is due to the principle of hope which exists in 
Christianity, but is absent in Buddhism. The one 
has always believed in a kingdom of God here and 
a blessed immortality hereafter. Buddhism has 
not this hope ; and this, says Kuenen, " is a blank 
which nothing can fill." So large a thinker as 
Albert Reville has expressed his belief that even 
the intolerance of Christianity indicated a passion- 
ate love of truth which has created modern science. 
He says that " if Europe had not passed through 
those ages of intolerance, it is doubtful whether the 
science of our day would ever have arrived." 2 It 
is only within the boundaries of nations professing 

1 Hibbert Lectures, 1882, page 291. 

2 A. Ke*ville : Prolegomenes de VHistoire des Religions. 



82 BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 

the Christian faith that we must go to-day to learn 
the latest discoveries in science, the best works of 
art, the most flourishing literature. Only within 
the same circle of Christian states is there a gov- 
ernment by law, and not by will. Only within 
these boundaries have the rights of the individual 
been secured, while the power of the state has been 
increased. Government by law, joined with per- 
sonal freedom, is only to be found where the faith 
exists which teaches that God not only supports the 
universal order of natural things, but is also the 
friend of the individual soul ; and in just that circle 
of states in which the doctrine is taught that there 
is no individual soul for God to love and no Divine 
presence in the order of nature, human life has sub- 
sided into apathy, progress has ceased, and it has 
been found impossible to construct national unity. 
Saint-Hilaire affirms 1 that " in politics and legisla- 
tion the dogma of Buddhism has remained inferior 
even to that of Brahmanism," and " has been able 
to do nothing to constitute states or to govern them 
by equitable rules." These Buddhist nations are 
really six : Siam, Burma, Nepaul, Thibet, Tartary, 
and Ceylon. The activity and social progress in 
China and Japan are no exceptions to this rule; 
for in neither country has Buddhism any appre- 
ciable influence on the character of the people. 
To those who deny that the theology of a people 

1 Le Bouddha et sa Religion, page 149, par J. Barthelemy 
Saint-Hilaire, Paris. 



BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 83 

influences its character, it may be instructive to 
see how exactly the good and evil influences of 
Buddhism correspond to the positive and negative 
traits of its doctrine. Its merits, says Saint- 
Hilaire, are its practical character, its abnegation 
of vulgar gratifications, its benevolence, mildness, 
sentiment of human equality, austerity of manners, 
dislike of falsehood, and respect for the family. 
Its defects are want of social power, egotistical 
aims, ignorance of the ideal good, of the sense 
of human right and human freedom, skepticism, in- 
curable despair, contempt of life. All its human 
qualities correspond to its doctrinal teaching from 
the beginning. It has always taught benevolence, 
patience, self-denial, charity, and toleration. Its 
defects arise inevitably from its negative aim, — to 
get rid of sorrow and evil by sinking into apathy, 
instead of seeking for the triumph of good and the 
coming of a reign of God here on the earth. 

As regards the Buddha himself, modern students 
differ widely. Some, of course, deny his very 
existence, and reduce him to a solar myth. M. 
Emile Senart, as quoted by Oldenberg, 1 following 
the Lalita Vistara as his authority, makes of him 
a solar hero, born of the morning cloud, contend- 
ing by the power of light with the demons of dark- 
ness, rising in triumph to the zenith of heavenly 
glory, then passing into the night of Nirvana and 
disappearing from the scene. 

1 Senart : Essai sur la Legende du Buddha. Paris, 1875. 



84 BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 

The difficulty about this solar myth theory is 
that it proves too much ; it is too powerful a sol- 
vent; it would dissolve all history. How easy it 
would be, in a few centuries, to turn General 
Washington and the American Revolution into 
a solar myth ! Great Britain, a region of clouds 
and rain, represents the Kingdom of Darkness ; 
America, with more sunshine, is the Day. Great 
Britain, as Darkness, wishes to devour the Young 
Day, or dawn of light, which America is about to 
diffuse over the earth. But Washington, the solar 
hero, arrives. He is from Virginia, that is, born of 
a virgin. He was born in February, in the sign 
of Aquarius and the Fishes, — plainly referring to 
the birth of the sun from the ocean. As the sun 
surveys the earth, so Washington was said to be 
a surveyor of many regions. The story of the 
fruitless attempts of the Indians to shoot him at 
Braddock's defeat is evidently legendary; and, 
in fact, this battle itself must be a myth, for how 
can we suppose two English and French armies 
to have crossed the Atlantic, and then gone into 
a wilderness west of the mountains, to fight a 
battle ? So easy is it to turn history into a solar 
myth. 

The character of Sakya-muni must be learned 
from his religion and from authentic tradition. 
In many respects his character and influence 
resembled that of Jesus. He opposed priestly 
assumptions, taught the equality and brotherhood 



BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 85 

of man, sent out disciples to teach his doctrine, 
was a reformer who relied on the power of truth 
and love. Many of his reported sayings resemble 
those of Jesus. He was opposed by the Brahmans 
as Jesus by the Pharisees. He compared the 
Brahmans who followed their traditions to a chain 
of blind men, who move on, not seeing where they 
go. 1 Like Jesus, he taught that mercy was better 
than sacrifices. Like Jesus, he taught orally, and 
left no writing. Jesus did not teach in Hebrew, 
but in the Aramaic, which was the popular dialect, 
and so the Buddha did not speak to the people in 
Sanskrit, but in their own tongue, which was Pali. 
Like Jesus, he seems to have instructed his hear- 
ers by parables or stories. He was one of the 
greatest reformers the world has ever seen; and 
his influence, after that of the Christ, has probably 
exceeded that of any one who ever lived. 

But, beside such real resemblances between 
these two masters, we are told of others still more 
striking, which would certainly be hard to explain 
unless one of the systems had borrowed from the 
other. These are said to be the preexistence of 
Buddha in heaven ; his birth of a virgin ; saluta- 
tion by angels ; presentation in the temple ; bap- 
tism by fire and water ; dispute with the doctors ; 
temptation in the wilderness; transfiguration; 

1 Oldenberg : Buddha, sein Leben, seine Lehre, seine Gemeinde. 
Berlin, 1881. This is one of the latest and best books on our 
subject. 



86 BUDDHISM AND CHBISTIANITY 

descent into hell; ascension into heaven. 1 If 
these legends could be traced back to the time 
before Christ, then it might be argued that the 
Gospels have borrowed from Buddhism. Such, 
however, is not the fact. These stories are taken 
from the Lalita Vistara, which, according to Rhys 
Davids, 2 was probably composed between six hun- 
dred and a thousand years after the time of Bud- 
dha, by some Buddhist poet in Nepaul. Rhys 
Davids, one of our best authorities, says of this 
poem : " As evidence of what early Buddhism ac- 
tually was, it is of about the same value as some 
mediaeval poem would be of the real facts of the 
gospel history." 3 M. Ernest de Bunsen, in his 
work on the " Angel Messiah," has given a very 
exhaustive statement, says Mr. Davids, of all the 
possible channels through which Christians can be 
supposed to have borrowed from the Buddhists. 
But Mr. Davids's conclusion is that he finds no 
evidence of any such communications of ideas from 
the East to the West. 3 The difference between 
the wild stories of the Lalita Vistara and the 
sober narratives of the Gospels is quite apparent. 
Another writer, Professor Seydel, 4 thinks, after a 
full and careful examination, that only five facts in 

1 Three Lectures on Buddhism : " Romantic Legend of Buddha," 
by Samuel Beal. London, 1875. Eitel. 

2 Hibbert Lectures: "Origin and Growth of Buddhism," by T. 
W. Rhys Davids. 1881. 

3 Ibid., page 143. 

4 Buddhistisch-Christliche Harmonie. 



BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 87 

the Gospels may have been borrowed from Bud- 
dhism. These are : (1) The fast of Jesus before 
his work ; (2) The question in regard to the blind 
man — " Who did sin, this man, or his parents "? 
(3) The preexistence of Christ ; (4) The presen- 
tation in the Temple ; (5) Nathanael sitting under 
a fig-tree, compared with Buddha under a Bo-tree. 
But Kuenen has examined these parallels, and con- 
siders them merely accidental coincidences. And, 
in truth, it is very hard to conceive of one religion 
borrowing its facts or legends from another, if 
that other stands in no historic relation to it. 
That Buddhism should have taken much from 
Brahmanism is natural ; for Brahmanism was its 
mother. That Christianity should have borrowed 
many of its methods from Judaism is equally natu- 
ral ; for Judaism was its cradle. Modern travelers 
in Burma and Tartary have found that the Bud- 
dhists hold a kind of camp-meeting in the open 
air, where they pray and sing. Suppose that some 
critic, noticing this, should assert that, when Wes- 
ley and his followers established similar customs, 
they must have borrowed them from the Buddhists. 
The absurdity would be evident. New religions 
grow, they are not imitations. 

It has been thought, however, that Christianity 
was derived from the Essenes, because of certain 
resemblances, and ifc is argued that the Essenes 
must have obtained their monastic habits from the 
Therapeutse in Egypt, and that the Therapeutae 



88 BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 

received them from the Buddhists, because they 
could not have found them elsewhere. This the- 
ory, however, has been dismissed from the scene 
by the young German scholar, 1 who has proved 
that the essay on the Therapeutae ascribed to Philo 
was really written by a Christian anchorite in the 
third or fourth century. 

The result, then, of our investigation, is this : 
There is no probability that the analogies between 
Christianity and Buddhism have been derived the 
one from the other. They have come from the 
common and universal needs and nature of man, 
which repeat themselves again and again in like 
positions and like circumstances. That Jesus and 
Buddha should both have retired into the wilder- 
ness before undertaking their great work is prob- 
able, for it has been the habit of other reformers 
to let a period of meditation precede their coming 
before the world. That both should have been 
tempted to renounce their enterprise is also in 
accordance with human nature. That, in after 
times, the simple narratives should be overlaid 
with additions, and a whole mass of supernatural 
wonders added, — as we find in the Apocryphal 
Gospels and the Lalita Vistara, — is also in accord- 
ance with the working of the human mind. 

Laying aside all such unsatisfactory resem- 
blances, we must regard the Buddha as having 

1 P. E. Lucius : Die Therapeuten und ihre Stellung, &c. Strass- 
burg, 1880. 



BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY 89 

been one of the noblest of men, and one whom 
Jesus would have readily welcomed as a fellow 
worker and a friend. He opposed a dominant 
priesthood, maintained the equal religious rights of 
all mankind, overthrew caste, encouraged woman 
to take her place as man's equal, forbade all bloody- 
sacrifices, and preached a religion of peace and 
good will, seeking to triumph only in the fair con- 
flict of reason with reason. If he was defective 
in the loftiest instincts of the soul ; if he knew no- 
thing of the infinite and eternal; if he saw nothing 
permanent in the soul of man ; if his highest pur- 
pose was negative, — to escape from pain, sorrow, 
anxiety, toil, — let us still be grateful for the in- 
fluence which has done so much to tame the savage 
Mongols, and to introduce hospitality and humanity 
into the homes of Lassa and Siam. If Edwin 
Arnold, a poet, idealizes him too highly, it is the 
better fault, and should be easily forgiven. Hero- 
worshipers are becoming scarce in our time ; let us 
make the most of those we have. 



WHY I AM NOT A FREE-RELIGIONIST 1 

What is meant by " Free Religion " ? I under- 
stand by it, individualism in religion. It is the 
religious belief which has made itself independ- 
ent of historic and traditional influences, so far 
as it is in the power of any one to attain such 
independence. In Christian lands it means a re- 
ligion which has cut loose from the Bible and the 
Christian Church, and which is as ready to ques- 
tion the teaching of Jesus as that of Socrates or 
Buddha. It is, what Emerson called himself, an 
endless seeker, with no past behind it. It is entire 
trust in the private reason as the sole authority in 
matters of religion. 

Free Religion may be regarded as Protestantism 
carried to its ultimate results. A Protestant 
Christian accepts the leadership of Jesus, and 
keeps himself in the Christian communion ; but he 
uses his own private judgment to discover what 
Jesus taught, and what Christianity really is. The 
Free Religionist goes a step farther, and decides 
by his own private judgment what is true and 
what false, no matter whether taught by Jesus or 
not. 

1 The North American Review, October, 1887. 



WHY I AM NOT A FBEE-BELIGIONIST 91 

Free Religion, as thus understood, seems to me 
opposed to the law of evolution, and incompatible 
with it. Evolution educes the present from the 
past by a continuous process. Free Religion cuts 
itself loose from the past, and makes every man 
the founder of his own religion. According to 
the law of evolution, confirmed by history, every 
advance in religion is the development from some- 
thing going before. Jewish monotheism grew out 
of polytheism ; Christianity and Mohammedanism 
out of Judaism ; Buddhism out of Brahmanism ; 
Protestant Christianity out of the Roman Catholic 
Church. Jesus himself said, " Think not that I 
am come to destroy the Law or the Prophets : 
I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil." The 
higher religions are not made ; they grow. Of 
each it may be said, as of the poet : " Nascitur, 
non fit." Therefore, if there is to arrive some- 
thing higher than our existing Christianity, it 
must not be a system which forsakes the Christian 
belief, but something developed from it. 

According to the principle of evolution, every 
growing and productive religion obeys the laws of 
heredity and of variation. It has an inherited 
common life, and a tendency to modification by 
individual activity. Omit or depress either factor, 
and the religion loses its power of growth. With- 
out a common life, the principle of development is 
arrested. He who leaves the great current which 
comes from the past loses headway. This current, 



92 WHY I AM NOT A FREE-RELIGIONIST 

in the Christian communion, is the inherited 
spirit of Jesus. It is his life, continued in his 
Church ; his central convictions of love to God 
and to man ; of fatherhood and brotherhood ; of 
the power of truth to conquer error, of good 
to overcome evil ; of a Kingdom of Heaven to 
come to us here. It is the faith of Jesus in things 
unseen ; his hope of the triumph of right over 
wrong; his love going down to the lowliest child 
of God. These vital convictions in the soul of 
Jesus are commimicated by contact from genera- 
tion to generation. They are propagated, as he 
suggested, like leaven hidden in the dotigh. By 
a different figure, Plato, in his dialogue of Ion, 
shows that inspiration is transmitted like the mag- 
netic influence, which causes iron rings to adhere 
and hang together in a chain. Thoughts and 
opinions are communicated by argument, reason- 
ing, speech, and writing ; but faith and inspiration 
by the influence of life on life. The life of Jesus 
is thus continued in his Church, and those who 
stand outside of it lose much of this transmitted 
and sympathetic influence. Common life in a 
religious body furnishes the motive force which 
carries it forward, while individual freedom gives 
the power of improvement. The two principles 
of heredity and variation must be united in order 
to combine union and freedom, and to secure pro- 
gress. Where freedom of thought ceases, religion 
becomes rigid. It is incapable of development. 



WHY I AM NOT A FREE-RELIGIONIST 93 

Such, for instance, is the condition of Buddhism, 
which, at first full of intellectual activity, has now 
hardened into a monkish ritual. 

Free Keligion sacrifices the motive power de- 
rived from association and religious sympathy for 
the sake of a larger intellectual freedom. The 
result is individualism. It founds no churches, 
but spends much force in criticising the Christian 
community, its belief, and its methods. These 
are, no doubt, open to criticism, which would do 
good if administered sympathetically and from 
within, but produce little result when delivered 
in the spirit of antagonism. Imperfect as the 
Christian Church is, it ought to be remembered 
that in it are to be found the chief strength and 
help of the charities, philanthropies, and moral 
reforms of our time. Every one who has at heart 
a movement for the benefit of humanity appeals 
instinctively for aid to the Christian churches. It 
is in these that such movements usually originate, 
and are carried on. Even when, as in the anti- 
slavery movement, a part of the churches refuse 
to sympathize with a new moral or social move- 
ment, the reproaches made against them show that 
in the mind of the community an interest in all 
humane endeavor is considered to be a part of 
their work. The common life and convictions 
of these bodies enable them to accomplish what 
individualism does not venture to undertake. In- 
dividualism is incapable of organized and sustained 



94 WHY I AM XOT A FREE-BELIGIOXIST 

work of this sort, though it can. and often does, 
cooperate earnestly with it. 

The teaching of Jesus is founded on the syn- 
thesis of Truth and Love. Jesus declares himself 
to have been born " to bear witness to the truth," 
and he also makes love, divine and human, the 
substance of Ins gospel. The love element pro- 
duces union, the truth element, freedom. Union 
without freedom stiffens into a rigid conservatism. 
Freedom without union breaks up into an intel- 
lectual atomism. The Christian churches have 
gone into both extremes, but never permanently ; 
for Christianity, as long as it adheres to its founder 
and his ideas, has the power of self-recovery. Its 
diseases are self-limited. 

It has had many such periods, but has recovered 
from them. It passed through an age in which 
it ran to ascetic self-denial, and made saints of 
self-torturing anchorites. It afterward became a 
speculative system, and tended to metaphysical 
creeds and doctrinal distinctions. It became a 
persecuting church, burning heretics and Jews, 
and torturing infidels as an act of faith. It was 
tormented by dark superstitions, believing in witch- 
craft and magic. But it has left all these evils 
behind. Xo one is now put to death for heresy or 
witchcraft. The monastic orders in the Church 
are preachers and teachers, or given to charity. 
Xo one could be burned to-day as a heretic. Xo 
one to-day believes in witchcraft. The old creeds 



WHY I AM NOT A FREE-RELIGIONIST 95 

which once held the Church in irons are now slowly 
disintegrating. But reform, as I have said, must 
come from within, by the gradual elimination of 
those inherited beliefs which interfere with the 
unity of the Church and the leadership of Christ 
himself. The Platonic and Egyptian Trinity re- 
maining as dogma, repeated but not understood, 
— the Manichaean division of the human race into 
children of God and children of the Devil, — 
the scholastic doctrine of the Atonement, by which 
the blood of Jesus expiates human guilt, — are 
being gradually explained in accordance with rea- 
son and the teaching of Jesus. 

Some beliefs, once thought to be of vital impor- 
tance, are now seen by many to be unessential, or 
are looked at in a different light. Instead of mak- 
ing Jesus an exceptional person, we are coming to 
regard him as a representative man, the realized 
ideal of what man was meant to be, and will one 
day become. Instead of considering his sinless- 
ness as setting him apart from his race, we look 
on it as showing that sin is not the natural, but 
unnatural, condition of mankind. His miracles 
are regarded not as violations of the laws of 
nature, but anticipations of laws which one day 
will be universally known, and which are bound- 
less as the universe. Nor will they in future be 
regarded as evidence of the mission of Jesus, since 
he himself was grieved when they were so looked 
upon, and he made his truth and his character the 



96 WHY I AM NOT A FREE-RELIGIONIST 

true evidence that he came from God. The old 
distinction between " natural " and " supernatural " 
will disappear when it is seen that Jesus had a 
supernatural work and character, the same in kind 
as ours, though higher in degree. The supreme 
gifts which make him the providential leader of 
the race do not set him apart from his brethren 
if we see that it is a law of humanity that gifts 
differ, and that men endowed with superior powers 
become leaders in science, art, literature, politics ; 
as Jesus has become the chief great spiritual leader 
of mankind. 

Men are now searching the Scriptures, not under 
the bondage of an infallible letter, but seeking 
for the central ideas of Jesus and the spirit of 
his gospel. They begin to accept the maxim of 
Goethe : " No matter how much the gospels con- 
tradict each other, provided the Gospel does not 
contradict itself." The profound convictions of 
Christ, which pervade all his teaching, give the 
clue by which to explain the divergences in the 
narrative. We interpret the letter by the light 
of the spirit. We see how Jesus emphasized the 
law of human happiness, — that it comes from 
within, not from without ; that the pure in heart 
see God, and that it is more blessed to give than 
to receive. We comprehend the stress he lays on 
the laws of progress, — that he who humbleth him- 
self shall be exalted. We recognize his profound 
conviction that all God's children are dear to him, 



WHY I AM NOT A FREE-RELIGIONIST 97 

that his sun shines on the evil and the good, and 
that he will seek the one lost sheep till he find it. 
We see his trust in the coming of the Kingdom 
of God in this world, the triumph of good over 
evil, and the approaching time when the know- 
ledge of God shall fill the earth as the waters 
cover the sea. And we find his profound faith 
in the immortal life which abides in us, so that 
whoever shares that faith with him can never die. 

The more firmly these central ideas of Jesus are 
understood and held, the less importance belongs 
to any criticism of the letter. This or that saying, 
attributed to Jesus in the record, may be subjected 
to attack ; but it is the main current of his teach- 
ing which has made him the leader of civilized 
man for eighteen centuries. That majestic stream 
will sweep on undisturbed, though there may be 
eddies here or stagnant pools there, which induce 
hasty observers to suppose that it has ceased to 
flow. 

" Rusticus expectat dum defluit amnis, at ille 
Volvitur et volvetur, in omne volubilis sevium." 

I sometimes read attacks on special sayings of 
the record, which argue, to the critic's mind, that 
Jesus was in error here, or mistaken there. But 
I would recommend to such writers to ponder the 
suggestive rule of Coleridge : " Until I can under- 
stand the ignorance of Plato, I shall consider 
myself ignorant of his understanding ; " or the 
remark of Emerson to the youth who brought him 



98 WHY I AM NOT A FREE-RELIGIONIST 

a paper in which he thought he had refuted Plato : 
" If you attack the king, be sure that you kill 
him." 

When the Christian world really takes Jesus 
himself as its leader, instead of building its faith 
on opinions about him, we may anticipate the 
arrival of that union which he foresaw and fore- 
told — " As thou, father, art in me, and I in thee, 
that they also may be one in us, that the world may 
believe that thou hast sent me." Then Christians, 
ceasing from party strife and sectarian dissension, 
will unite in one mighty effort to cure the evils of 
humanity and redress its wrongs. Before a united 
Christendom, what miseries could remain unre- 
lieved ? War, that criminal absurdity, that mon- 
strous anachronism, must at last be abolished. 
Pauperism, vice, and crime, though continuing in 
sporadic forms, would cease to exist as a part of 
the permanent institutions of civilization. A truly 
Catholic Church, united under the Master, would 
lead all humanity up to a higher plane. The im- 
mense forces developed by modern science, and the 
magnificent discoveries in the realm of nature, help- 
less now to cure the wrongs of suffering man, would 
become instruments of potent use under the guid- 
ance of moral forces. 

According to the law of evolution, this is what 
we have a right to expect. If we follow the lines 
of historic development, not being led into ex- 
treme individualism ; if we maintain the continuity 



WHY I AM NOT A FREE-RELIGIONIST 99 

of human progress, this vast result must finally 
arrive. For such reasons I prefer to remain in 
the communion of the Christian body, doing what 
I may to assist its upward movement. For such 
reasons I am not a Free Religionist. 



HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 1 

To answer this question, we must first inquire 
what we mean by a soul. If we mean a human 
soul, it is certain that animals do not possess it, — 
at least not in a fully developed condition. If we 
mean, " Do they possess an immortal soul? " that 
is, perhaps, a question difficult to answer either in 
the affirmative or the negative. But if we mean 
by the soul an immaterial principle of life, which 
coordinates the bodily organization to a unity ; 
which is the ground of growth, activity, percep- 
tion, volition ; which is intelligent, affectionate, 
and to a certain extent free ; then we must admit 
that animals have souls. 

The same arguments which induce us to believe 
that there is a soul in man apply to animals. The 
world has generally believed that in man, beside 
the body, there is also soul. Why have people 
believed it ? The reason probably is, that, beside 
all that can be accounted for as the result of the 
juxtaposition of material particles, there remains 
a very important element unaccounted for. Me- 
chanical and physical agency may explain much, 
but the most essential characteristic of vital phe- 

1 The Atlantic Monthly, October, 1874. 



HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 101 

nomena they do not explain. They do not account 
for the unity in variety, permanence in change, 
growth from within by continuous processes, com- 
ing from the vital functions in an organized body. 
Every such body has a unity peculiar to itself, 
which cannot be considered the result of the collo- 
cation of material molecules. It is a unity which 
controls these molecules, arranges and rearranges 
them, maintains a steady activity, carries the body 
through the phenomena of growth, and causes the 
various organs to cooperate for the purposes of 
the whole. The vital power is not merely the 
result of material phenomena, but it reacts on these 
as a cause. Add to this that strange phenomenon 
of human consciousness, the sense of personality, 
— which is the clear perception of selfhood as a 
distinct unchanging unit, residing in a body all of 
whose parts are in perpetual flux, — and we see 
w r hy the opinion of a soul has arisen. It has been 
assumed by the common sense of mankind that in 
every living body the cause of the mode of exist- 
ence of each part is contained in the whole. As 
soon as death intervenes each part is left free 
to pass through changes peculiar to itself alone. 
Life is a power which acts from the whole upon 
the parts, causing them to resist chemical laws, 
which begin to act as soon as life departs. The 
unity of a living body does not result from an in- 
genious juxtaposition of parts, like that of a watch, 
for example. For the unity of a living body im- 



102 HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 

plies that which is called " the vital vortex," or 
perpetual exchange of particles. 

A watch or clock is the nearest approach which 
has been made by man to the creation of a living 
being. A watch, for instance, contains the prin- 
ciple of its action in itself, and is not moved from 
without ; in that it resembles a living creature. 
We can easily conceive of a watch which might be 
made to go seventy years, without being wound up. 
It might need to be oiled occasionally, but not as 
often as an animal needs to be fed. A watch is 
also like a living creature in having a unity as a 
whole not belonging to the separate parts, and to 
which all parts conspire, — namely, that of marking 
the progress of time. Why, then, say that a man 
has a soul, and that a watch has not ? The dif- 
ference is this. The higher principle of unity in 
the watch, that is, its power of marking time, is 
wholly an effect, and never a cause. It is purely 
and only the result of the arrangement of wheels 
and springs ; in other words, of material conditions. 
But in man, the principle of unity is also a cause. 
Life reacts upon body. The laws of matter are 
modified by the power of life, chemical action is 
suspended, living muscles are able to endure with- 
out laceration the application of forces which 
would destroy the dead fibre. So the thought, the 
love, the will of a living creature react on the physi- 
cal frame. A sight, a sound, a few spoken words, 
a message seen in a letter, cause an immense revul- 



HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 103 

sion in the physical condition. Something is sud- 
denly told us, and we faint away, or even die, from 
the effect of the message. Here mind acts upon 
matter, showing that in man mind is not merely a 
result, but also a cause. Hence men have gener- 
ally believed in the existence of a soul in man. 
They have not been taught it by metaphysicians, it 
is one of the spontaneous inductions of common 
sense from universal experience. 

But this argument applies equally to prove a 
soul in animals. The same reaction of soul on 
body is constantly apparent. Every time that you 
whistle to your dog, and he comes bounding toward 
you, his mind has acted on his body. His will has 
obeyed his thought, his muscles have obeyed his 
will. The cause of his motion was mental, not 
physical. This is too evident to require any fur- 
ther illustration. Therefore, regarding the soul 
as a principle of life, connected with the body but 
not its result, or, in other words, as an immaterial 
principle of activity, there is the same reason for 
believing in the soul of animals that there is for 
believing in the soul of man. 

But when we ask as to the nature of the animal 
soul, and how far it is analogous to that of man, 
we meet with certain difficulties. Let us see then 
how many of the human qualities of the soul are to 
be found in animals, and so discover if there is any 
remainder not possessed by them, peculiar to our- 
selves. 



104 HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 

That the vital soul, or principle of life, belongs 
equally to plants, animals, and men, is evident. 
This is so apparent as to be granted even by Des- 
cartes, who regards animals as mere machines, or 
automata, destitute of a thinking soul, but not of 
life or feeling. They are automata, but living and 
feeling automata. Descartes denies them a soul, 
because he defines the soul as the thinking and 
knowing power. But Locke (with whom Leibnitz 
fully agreed on this point) ascribes to animals 
thought as well as feeling, and makes their differ- 
ence from man to consist in their not possessing 
abstract ideas. "We shall presently see the truth 
of this most sagacious remark. 

Plants, animals, and men are alike in possessing 
the vital principle, which produces growth, which 
causes them to pass through regular phases of de- 
velopment, which enables them to digest and assim- 
ilate food taken from without, and which carries on 
a steady circulation within. To this are added, in 
the animal, the function of voluntary locomotion, 
perception through the senses of an outward world, 
the power of feeling pleasure and pain, some 
wonderful instincts, and some degree of reflective 
thought. Animals also possess memory, imagina- 
tion, playfulness, industry, the sense of shame, and 
many other very human qualities. 

Take, for example, Buffon's fine description of 
the dog ("Histoire du Chien") : — 

"By nature fiery, irritable, ferocious, and san- 



HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 105 

guinary, the dog in his savage state is a terror to 
other animals. But domesticated he becomes 
gentle, attached, and desirous to please. He has- 
tens to lay at the feet of his master his courage, 
his strength, and all his abilities. He listens for 
his master's orders, inquires his will, consults his 
opinion, begs his permission, understands the in- 
dications of his wishes. Without possessing the 
power of human thought, he has all the warmth of 
human sentiment. He has more than human fidel- 
ity, he is constant in his attachments. He is made 
up of zeal, ardor, and obedience. He remembers 
kindness longer than wrong. He endures bad 
treatment and forgets it — disarming it by patience 
and submission." 

No one who has ever had a dog for a friend will 
think this description exaggerated. If any should 
so consider it, we will cite for their benefit what 
Mr. Jesse, one of the latest students of the canine 
race, asserts concerning it, in his " Researches into 
the History of the British Dog" (London, 1866). 
He says that remarkable instances of the following 
virtues, feelings, and powers of mind are well au- 
thenticated : — 

" The dog risks his life to give help ; goes for 
assistance ; saves life from drowning, fire, other 
animals, and men ; assists distress ; guards pro- 
perty ; knows boundaries ; resents injuries ; repays 
benefits ; communicates ideas ; combines with other 
dogs for several purposes ; understands language ; 



106 HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 

knows when he is about to die ; knows death in a 
human being ; devotes his whole life to the object 
of his love ; dies of grief and of joy ; dies in his 
master's defense ; commits suicide ; remains by the 
dead ; solicits, and gives alarm ; knows the charac- 
ters of men ; recognizes a portrait, and men after 
long absence ; is fond of praise and sensible to ridi- 
cule ; feels shame, and is sensible of a fault ; is 
playful ; is incorruptible ; finds his way back from 
distant countries ; is magnanimous to smaller ani- 
mals ; is jealous ; has dreams ; and takes a last 
farewell when dying." 

Much of this, it may be said, is instinctive. We 
must therefore distinguish between Instinct and 
Intelligence ; or, rather, between instinctive intelli- 
gence and reflective intelligence. Many writers 
on the subject of animals have not carefully distin- 
guished these very different activities of the soul. 
Even M. Leroy, one of the first in modern times 
who brought careful observation to the study of 
the nature of animals, has not always kept in view 
this distinction — as has been noticed by a subse- 
quent French writer of very considerable ability, 
M. Flourens. 1 The following marks, according 
to M. Flourens, distinguish instinct from intelli- 
gence : — 

1 The Intelligence and Perfectibility of Animals, by C. G. Leroy. 
Translated into English in 1870. Be V Instinct et V Intelligence des 
Animaux, par P. Flourens. Paris, 1864. 



HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 107 

INSTINCT INTELLIGENCE 

Is spontaneous, Is deliberate, 

" necessary, u conditional, 

" invariable, " modifiable, 

" innate, comes from observation 

and experience, 

" fatal, is free, 

" particular. " general. 

Thus the building faculty of the beaver is an in- 
stinct, for it acts spontaneously, and always in the 
same way. It is not a general faculty of building 
in all places and ways, but a special power of 
building houses of sticks, mud, and other materials, 
with the entrance under water and a dry place 
within. When beavers build on a running stream, 
they begin by making a dam across it, which pre- 
serves them from losing the water in a drought ; 
but this also is a spontaneous and invariable act. 
The old stories of their driving piles, using their 
tails for trowels, and having well-planned houses 
with many chambers, have been found to be ficti- 
tious. That the beaver builds by instinct, though 
intelligence comes in to modify the instinct, appears 
from his wishing to build his house or his dam 
when it is not needed. Mr. Broderip, the English 
naturalist, had a pet beaver that manifested his 
building instinct by dragging together warming- 
pans, sweeping-brushes, boots, and sticks, which he 
would lay crosswise. He then would fill in his 
wall with clothes, bits of coal, turf, laying it very 



108 HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 

even. Finally, he made a nest for himself behind 
his wall with clothes, hay, and cotton. As this 
creature had been brought from America very 
young, all this procedure must have been instinc- 
tive. But his intelligence showed itself in his 
adapting his mode of building to his new circum- 
stances. His instinct led him to build his wall, 
and to lay his sticks crosswise, and to fill in with 
what he could find, according to the universal and 
spontaneous procedure of all beavers. But his 
making use of a chest of drawers for one side of 
his wall, and taking brushes and boots instead of 
cutting down trees, were no doubt acts of intelli- 
gence. 

A large part of the wonderful procedure of bees 
is purely instinctive. Bees, from the beginning 
of the world, and in all countries of the earth, 
have lived in similar communities ; have had their 
queen, to lay eggs for them : if their queen is lost, 
have developed a new one in the same way, by 
altering the conditions of existence in one of their 
larvae ; have constructed their hexagonal cells by 
the same mathematical law, so as to secure the 
most strength with the least outlay of material. 
All this is instinct — for it is spontaneous and not 
deliberate ; it is universal and constant. But when 
the bee deflects his comb in order to avoid a stick 
thrust across the inside of the hive, and begins the 
variation before he reaches the stick, this can only 
be regarded as an act of intelligence. 



HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 109 

Animals, then, have both instincts and intelli- 
gence ; and so has man. A large part of human 
life proceeds from tendencies as purely, if not as 
vigorously, instinctive as those of animals. Man 
has social instincts, which create human society. 
Children play- from an instinct. The maternal 
instinct in a human mother is, till modified by 
reflection, as spontaneous, universal, and necessary 
as the same instinct in animals. But in man the 
instincts are reduced to a minimum, and are soon 
modified by observation, experience, and reflection. 
In animals they are at their maximum, and are 
modified in a much less degree. 

It is sometimes said that animals do not reason, 
but man does. But animals are quite capable of 
at least two modes of reasoning, that of compari- 
son and that of inference. They compare two 
modes of action, or two substances, and judge the 
one to be preferable to the other, and accordingly 
select it. Sir Emerson Tennent tells us that ele- 
phants, employed to build stone walls in Ceylon, 
will lay each stone in its place, then stand off and 
look to see if it is plumb, and, if not, will move 
it with their trunk, till it lies perfectly straight. 
This is a pure act of reflective judgment. He 
narrates an adventure which befell himself in Cey- 
lon while riding on a narrow road through the 
forest. He heard a rumbling sound approaching, 
and directly there came to meet him an elephant, 
bearing on his tusks a large log of wood, which he 



110 HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 

had been directed to carry to the place where it 
was needed. Sir Emerson Tennent's horse, unused 
to these monsters, was alarmed, and refused to go 
forward. The sagacious elephant, perceiving this, 
evidently decided that he must himself go out of 
the way. But to do this, he was obliged first 
to take the log from his tusks with his trunk, 
and lay it on the ground, which he did, and then 
backed out of the road between the trees till only 
his head was visible. But the horse was still too 
timid to go by, whereupon the judicious pachyderm 
pushed himself farther back, till all of his body, 
except the end of his trunk, had disappeared. 
Then Sir Emerson succeeded in getting his horse 
by, but stopped to witness the result. The ele- 
phant came out, took the log up again, laid it 
across his tusks, and went on his way. This story, 
told by an unimpeachable witness, shows several 
successive acts of reasoning. The log-bearer in- 
ferred from the horse's terror that it would not 
pass ; he again inferred that in that case he must 
himself get out of the way ; that, to do this, he 
must lay down his log ; that he must go farther 
back; and accompanying this was his sense of 
duty, making him faithful to his task ; and, most 
of all, his consideration of what was due to this 
human traveler, which kept him from driving the 
horse and man before him as he went on. 

There is another well-authenticated anecdote of 
an elephant ; he was following an ammunition 



HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 111 

wagon, and saw the man who was seated on it fall 
off just before the wheel. The man would have 
been crushed had not the animal instantly run 
forward, and, without an order, lifted the wheel 
with his trunk, and held it suspended in the air, 
till the wagon had passed over the man without 
hurting him. Here were combined presence of 
mind, good will, knowledge of the danger to the 
man, and a rapid calculation of how he could be 
saved. 

Perhaps I may properly introduce here an ac- 
count of the manifestations of mind in the animals 
I have had the most opportunity of observing. I 
have a horse, who was named Rubezahl, after 
the mountain spirit of the Harz made famous in 
the stories of Musaeus. We have contracted his 
name to Ruby for convenience. Now I have rea- 
son to believe that Ruby can distinguish Sunday 
from other days. On Sunday I have been in the 
habit of driving to Boston to church ; but on 
other days, I drive to the neighboring village, 
where are the post-office, shops of mechanics, and 
other stores. To go to Boston, I usually turn to 
the right when I leave my driveway ; to go to the 
village, I turn to the left. Now, on Sunday, if I 
leave the reins loose, so that the horse may do as 
he pleases, he invariably turns to the right, and 
goes to Boston. On other days, he as invariably 
turns to the left, and goes to the village. He does 
this so constantly and regularly, that none of the 



112 HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 

family have any doubt of the fact that he knows 
that it is Sunday ; how he knows it we are unable 
to discover. I have left my house at the same 
hour on Sunday and on Monday, in the same 
carriage, with the same number of persons in it ; 
and yet on Sunday he always turns to the right, 
and on Monday to the left. He is fed at the same 
time on Sunday as on other days, but the man 
comes back to harness him a little later on Sunday 
than at other times, and that is possibly his method 
of knowing that it is the day for going to Boston. 
But see how much of observation, memory, and 
thought is implied in all this. 

Again, Ruby has shown a very distinct feeling 
of the supernatural. Driving one day up a hill 
near my house, we met a horse-car coming down 
toward us, running without horses, simply by the 
force of gravity. My horse became so frightened 
that he ran into the gutter, and nearly overturned 
me ; and I got him past with the greatest difficulty. 
Now he had met the cars coming down that hill, 
drawn by horses, a hundred times, and had never 
been alarmed. Moreover, only a day or two after, 
in going up the same hill, we saw a car moving 
uphill, before us, where the horses were entirely 
invisible, being concealed by the car itself, which 
was between us and the horses. But this did not 
frighten Ruby at all. He evidently said to him- 
self, " The horses are there, though I do not 
see them." But in the other case it seemed to 



HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 113 

him an effect without a cause — something plainly 
supernatural. There was nothing in the aspect 
of the car itself to alarm him ; he had seen that 
often enough. He was simply terrified by seeing 
it move without any adequate cause — just as we 
should be, if we saw our chairs begin to walk 
about the room. 

Our Newfoundland dog's name is Donatello ; 
which, again, is shortened to Don in common par- 
lance. He has all the affectionate and excellent 
qualities of his race. He is the most good-natured 
creature I ever saw. Nothing provokes him. Little 
dogs may yelp at him, the cat or kittens may snarl 
and spit at him : he pays no attention to them. 
A little dog climbs on his back, and lies down 
there ; one of the cats will lie between his legs. 
But at night, when he is on guard, no one can ap- 
proach the house unchallenged. 

But his affection for the family is very great. 
To be allowed to come into the house and lie down 
near us is his chief happiness. He was very fond 

of my son E , who played with him a good 

deal, and when the young man went away, during 
the war, with a three months' regiment, Don was 
much depressed by his absence. He walked down 
regularly to the station, and stood there till a train 
of cars came in ; and when his friend did not arrive 
in it, he went back, with a melancholy air, to the 
house. But at last the young man returned. It 
was in the evening, and Don was lying on the 



114 HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 

piazza. As soon as lie saw his friend, his exulta- 
tion knew no bounds. He leaped upon him, and 
ran round him, barking and showing th^ wildest 
signs of delight. All at once he turned and ran 
up into the garden, and came back bringing an 
apple, which he laid down at the feet of his young 
master. It was the only thing he could think of 
to do for him — and this sign of his affection was 
quite pathetic. 

The reason why Don thought of the apple was 
probably this : we had taught him to go and get 
an apple for the horse, when so directed. We 
would say, " Go, Don, get an apple for poor 
Ruby ; " then he would run up into the garden, 
and bring an apple, and hold it up to the horse ; 
and perhaps when the horse tried to take it he 
would pull it away. After doing this a few times, 
he would finally lie down on his back under the 
horse's nose, and allow the latter to take the apple 
from his mouth. He would also kiss the horse, on 
being told to do so. When we said, " Don, kiss 
poor Ruby," he leaped up and kissed the horse's 
nose. But he afterwards hit upon a more conven- 
ient method of doing it. He got his paw over the 
rein and pulled down the horse's head, so that he 
could continue the osculatory process more at his 
ease, sitting comfortably on the ground. 

Animals know when they have done wrong ; so 
far, at least, as that means disobeying our will 
or command. The only great fault which Don 



HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 115 

ever committed was stealing a piece of meat from 
our neighbor's kitchen. I do not think he was 
punished or even scolded for it ; for we did not 
find it out till later, when it would have done no 
good to punish him. But a week or two after 
that, the gentleman whose kitchen had been robbed 
was standing on my lawn, talking with me, and he 
referred, laughingly, to what Don had done. He 
did not even look at the dog, much less change his 
tones to those of rebuke. But the moment Don 
heard bis name mentioned, he turned and walked 
away, and hid himself under the low branches of 
a Norway spruce near by. He was evidently pro- 
foundly ashamed of himself. Was this the result 
of conscience, or of the love of approbation ? In 
either case, it was very human. 

That the love of approbation is common to many 
animals we all know. Dogs and horses certainly 
can be influenced by praise and blame, as easily as 
men. Many years ago we had occasion to draw 
a load of gravel, and we put Ruby into a tip-cart 
to do the work. He was profoundly depressed, 
and evidently felt it as a degradation. He hung 
his head, and showed such marks of humiliation 
that we have never done it since. But on the 
other hand, when he goes out, under the saddle, 
by the side of a young horse, this veteran animal 
tries as hard to appear young as any old bachelor 
of sixty years who is still ambitious of social 
triumphs. He dances along, and goes sideways, 



116 HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 

and has all the airs and graces of a young colt. 
All this, too, is very human. 

At one time my dog was fond of going to the 
railway station to see the people, and I always 
ordered him to go home, fearing he should be hurt 
by the cars. He easily understood that if he went 
there, it was contrary to my wishes. Nevertheless, 
he often went ; and I do not know but this fond- 
ness for forbidden fruit was rather human, too. 
So, whenever he was near the station, if he saw 
me coming, he would look the other way, and pre- 
tend not to know me. If he met me anywhere 
else, he always bounded to meet me with great 
delight. But at the station it was quite different. 
He would pay no attention to my whistle or my 
call. He even pretended to be another dog, and 
would look me right in the face without appar- 
ently recognizing me. He gave me the cut direct, 
in the most impertinent manner; the reason evi- 
dently being that he knew he was doing what was 
wrong, and did not like to be found out. Possibly 
he may have relied a little on my near-sightedness, 
in this manoeuvre. 

That animals have acute observation, memory, 
imagination, the sense of approbation, strong af- 
fections, and the power of reasoning is therefore 
very evident. Lord Bacon also speaks of a dog's 
reverence for his master as partaking of a religious 
element. " Mark," says he, " what a generosity 
and courage a dog will put on, when he finds him- 



HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 117 

self maintained by a man, who to him is instead 
of a God — which courage he could not attain, 
without that confidence in a better nature than his 
own." Who that has seen the mute admiration 
and trust in a dog's eye, as he looks up at his 
master, but can see in it something of a religious 
reverence, the germ and first principle of religion ? 

What, then, is the difference between the human 
soul and that of the animal in its highest develop- 
ment ? 

That there is a very marked difference between 
man and the highest animal is evident. The hu- 
man being, weaker in proportion than all other 
animals, has subjected them all to himself. He 
has subdued the earth by his inventions. Physi- 
cally too feeble to dig a hole in the ground like 
a rabbit, or to fell a tree like a beaver ; unable to 
live in the water like a fish, or to move through 
the air like a bird ; he yet, by his inventive power 
and his machinery, can compel the forces of nature 
to work for him. They are the true genii, slaves 
of his lamp. Air, fire, water, electricity, and mag- 
netism build his cities and his stately ships, run 
his errands, carry him from land to land, and ac- 
cept him as their master. 

Whence does man obtain this power? Some 
say it is the human hand which has made man 
supreme. It is, no doubt, a wonderful machine ; 
a box of tools in itself. The size and strength of 
the thumb, and the power of opposing it to the 



118 HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 

extremities of the fingers, distinguishes, according 
to most anatomists, the human hand from that of 
the quadrumanous animals. In those monkeys 
which are nearest to man, the thumb is so short 
and weak, and the fingers so long and slender, that 
their tips can scarcely be brought in opposition. 
Excellent for climbing, they are not good for tak- 
ing up small objects or supporting large ones. 
But the hand of man could accomplish little with- 
out the mind behind it. It was therefore a good 
remark of Galen, that " man is not the wisest of 
animals because he has a hand ; but God has given 
him a hand because he is the wisest of animals." 

The size of the human brain, relatively greater 
than that of almost any other animal ; man's struc- 
ture, adapting him to stand erect ; his ability to 
exist in all climates ; his power of subsisting on 
varied food : all these facts of his physical nature 
are associated with his superior mental power, but 
do not produce it. The question recurs, What 
enables him to stand at the head of the animal 
creation ? 

Perhaps the chief apparent distinctions between 
man and other animals are these : — 

1. The lowest races of men use tools ; other 
animals do not. 

2. The lowest human beings possess a verbal 
language ; other animals have none. 

3. Man has the capacity of self-culture, as an 
individual ; other animals have not. 



HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 119 

4. Human beings, associated in society, are 
capable of progress in civilization, by means of 
science, art, literature, and religion ; other animals 
are not. 

5. Men have a capacity for religion ; no animal, 
except man, has this. 

The lowest races of men use tools, but no other 
animal does this. This is so universally admitted 
by science that the presence of the rudest tools of 
stone is considered a sufficient trace of the presence 
of man. If stone hatchets or hammers or arrow- 
heads are found in any stratum, though no human 
bones are detected, anthropologists regard this as a 
sufficient proof of the existence of human beings in 
the period indicated by such a geologic formation. 
The only tools used by animals in procuring food, 
in war, or in building their homes, are their natural 
organs : their beaks, teeth, claws, etc. It may be 
added that man alone wears clothes ; other animals 
being sufficiently clothed by nature. No animals 
make a fire, though they often suffer from cold ; 
but there is no race of men unacquainted with the 
use of fire. 1 

No animals possess a verbal language. Animals 
can remember some of the words used by men, and 
associate with them their meaning. But this is 
not the use of language. It is merely the memory 
of two associated facts, — as when the animal re- 
collects where he found food, and goes to the same 

1 It is a mistake to say that the Tasmanians do not use fire. 



120 HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 

place to look for it again. Animals have different 
cries, indicating different wants. They use one 
cry to call their mate, another to terrify their prey. 
But this is not the use of verbal language. Hu- 
man language implies not merely an acquaintance 
with the meaning of particular words, but the 
power of putting them together in a sentence. 
Animals have no such language as this ; for, if 
they had, it would have been learned by men. 
Man has the power of learning any verbal lan- 
guage. Adelung and Vater reckon over three 
thousand languages spoken by men, and any man 
can learn any of them. The negroes speak their 
own languages in their own countries ; they speak 
Arabic in North Africa ; they learn to speak Eng- 
lish, French, and Spanish in America, and Oriental 
languages when they go to the East. If any ani- 
mals had a verbal language, with its vocabulary 
and grammar, men would long ago have learned 
it, and would have been able to converse with 
them. 

Again, no animal except man is capable of self- 
culture, as an individual. Animals are trained by 
external influences ; they do not teach themselves. 
An old wolf is much more cunning than a young 
one, but he has been made so by the force of cir- 
cumstances. You can teach your dog tricks, but 
no dog has ever taught himself any. Yet the 
lowest savages teach themselves to make tools, 
to ornament their paddles and clubs, and acquire 



HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 121 

certain arts by diligent effort. Birds will some- 
times practice the tunes which they hear played, 
till they have learned them. They will also some- 
times imitate each other's songs. That is, they 
possess the power of vocal imitation. But to imi- 
tate the sounds we hear is not self-culture. It is 
not developing a new power, but it is exercising 
in a new way a natural gift. Yet we must admit 
that in this habit of birds there is the rudiment, at 
least, of self-education. 

All races of men are capable of progress in civ- 
ilization. Many, indeed, remain in a savage state 
for thousands of years, and we cannot positively 
prove that any particular race which has always 
been uncivilized is capable of civilization. But we 
are led to believe it from having known of so many 
tribes of men who have emerged from apathy, igno- 
rance, and barbarism into the light of science and 
art. So it was with all the Teutonic races, — the 
Goths, Germans, Kelts, Lombards, Scandinavians. 
So it was with the Arabs, who roamed for thou- 
sands of years over the deserts, a race of ignorant 
robbers, and then, filled with the great inspiration 
of Islam, flamed up into a brilliant coruscation 
of science, literature, art, military success, and 
profound learning. What great civilizations have 
grown up in China, India, Persia, Assyria, Baby- 
lon, Phoenicia, Egypt, Greece, Rome, Carthage, 
Etruria ! But no such progress has ever appeared 
among the animals. As their parents were, five 



122 HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 

thousand years ago, so, essentially, are they 
now. 

Nor are animals religious, in the sense of wor- 
shiping unseen powers higher than themselves. 
My horse showed a sense of the supernatural, but 
this is not worship. 

These are some of the most marked points of 
difference between man and all other animals. 
Now these can all be accounted for by the hypo- 
thesis in which Locke and Leibnitz both agreed ; 
namely, that while animals are capable of reason- 
ing about facts, they are incapable of abstract 
ideas. Or, we may say with Coleridge, that while 
animals, in common with man, possess the faculty 
of understanding, they do not possess that of reason. 
Coleridge seems to have intended by this exactly 
what Locke and Leibnitz meant by their statement. 
When my dog Don heard the word " apple," he 
thought of the particular concrete apple under the 
tree ; and not of apples in general, and their re- 
lation to pears, peaches, etc. Don understood me 
when I told him to go and get an apple, and 
obeyed ; but he would not have understood me if 
I had remarked to him that apples were better than 
pears, more wholesome than peaches, not so hand- 
some as grapes. I should then have gone into the 
region of abstract and general ideas. 

Now it is precisely the possession of this power 
of abstract thought which will explain the superi- 
ority of man to all other animals. It explains the 






HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 123 

use of tools ; for a tool is an instrument prepared, 
not for one special purpose, but to be used gener- 
ally, in certain ways. A baboon, like a man, might 
pick up a particular stone with which to crack a 
particular nut ; but the ape does not make and 
keep a stone hammer, to be used on many similar 
occasions. A box of tools contains a collection of 
saws, planes, draw-knives, etc., not made to use on 
one occasion merely, but made for sawing, cutting, 
and planing purposes generally. 

Still more evident is it that the power of ab- 
straction is necessary for verbal language. We do 
not here use the common term " articulate speech," 
for we can conceive of animals articulating their 
vocal sounds. But " a word " is an abstraction. 
The notion is lifted out of the concrete particular 
fact, and deposited in the abstract general term. 
All words, except proper names, are abstract; and 
to possess and use a verbal language is impossible, 
without the possession of this mental faculty. 

In regard to self-culture, it is clear that for any 
steady progress one must keep before his mind an 
abstract idea of what hie wishes to do. This ena- 
bles him to rise above impulse, passion, instinct, 
habit, circumstance. By the steady contemplation 
of the proposed aim, one can arrange circum- 
stances, restrain impulse, direct one's activity, and 
become really free. 

In like manner, races become developed in civi- 
lization by the impact of abstract ideas. Some- 



124 HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 

times it is by coming in contact with other civilized 
nations, which gives them an ideal superior to any- 
thing before known. Sometimes the motive power 
of their progress is the reception of truths of sci- 
ence, art, literature, or religion. 

It is not necessary to show that without abstract, 
universal, and necessary ideas no religion is pos- 
sible ; for religion, being the worship of unseen 
powers, conceived as existing, as active, as spirit- 
ual, necessarily implies these ideas in the mind of 
the worshiper. 

We find, then, in the soul of animals all active, 
affectionate, and intelligent capacities, as in that 
of man. The only difference is that man is capable 
of abstract ideas, which give him a larger liberty of 
action, which enable him to adopt an aim and pur- 
sue it, and which change his affections from an in- 
stinctive attachment into a principle of generous 
love. Add, then, to the animal soul the capacity 
for abstract ideas, and it would rise at once to the 
level of man. Meantime, in a large part of their 
nature, they have the same faculties with ourselves. 
They share our emotions, and we theirs. They 
are made " a little lower " than man, and if we 
are souls, so surely are they. 

Are they immortal? To discuss this question 
would require more space than we can here give to 
it. For my own part, I fully believe in the con- 
tinued existence of all souls, at the same time as- 
suming their continued advance. The law of life 



HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 125 

is progress ; and one of the best features in the 
somewhat unspiritual theory of Darwin is its pro- 
found faith in perpetual improvement. This theory 
is the most startling optimism that has ever been 
taught, for it makes perpetual progress to be the 
law of the whole universe. 

Many of the arguments for the immortality of 
man cannot indeed be used for our dumb relations, 
the animals. We cannot argue from their univer- 
sal faith in a future life ; nor contend that they 
need an immortality on moral grounds, to recom- 
pense their good conduct and punish their wicked- 
ness. We might indeed adduce a reason implied 
in our Saviour's parable, and believe that the poor 
creatures who have received their evil things in this 
life will be comforted in another. Moreover, we 
might find in many animals qualities fitting them 
for a higher state. There are animals, as we have 
seen, who show a fidelity, courage, generosity, 
often superior to what we see in man. The dogs 
who have loved their master more than food, and 
starved to death on his grave, are surely well fitted 
for a higher existence, Jesse tells a story of a cat 
which was being stoned by cruel boys. Men went 
by, and did not interfere ; but a dog, that saw 
it, did. He drove away the boys, and then took 
the cat to his kennel, licked her all over with his 
tongue, and his conduct interested people, who 
brought her milk. The canine nurse took care of 
her till she was well, and the cat and dog remained 



126 HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 

fast friends ever after. Such an action in a man 
would have been called heroic ; and we think such 
a dog would not be out of place in heaven. 

Yet it is not so much on particular cases of ani- 
mal superiority that we rely, but on the difficulty 
of conceiving, in any sense, of the destruction of 
life. The principle of life, whether we call it soul 
or body, matter or spirit, escapes all observation of 
the senses. All that we know of it by observation 
is that, beside the particles of matter which com- 
pose an organized body, there is something else, 
not cognizable by the senses, which attracts and 
dismisses them, modifies and coordinates them. 
The unity of the body is not to be found in its 
sensible phenomena, but in something which escapes 
the senses. Into the vortex of that life material 
molecules are being continually absorbed, and from 
it they are perpetually discharged. If death means 
the dissolution of the body, we die many times in 
the course of our earthly career, for every body is 
said by human anatomists to be changed in all its 
particles once in seven years. What then remains, 
if all the particles go ? The principle of organiza- 
tion remains, and this invisible, persistent principle 
constitutes the identity of every organized body. If 
I say that I have the same body when I am fifty 
which I had at twenty, it is because I mean by 
" body " that which continues unaltered amid the 
fast-flying particles of matter. This life principle 
makes and remakes the material frame ; that body 






HAVE ANIMALS SOULS 127 

does not make it. When what we call death inter- 
venes, all that we can assert is that the life prin- 
ciple has done wholly and at once what it has 
always been doing gradually and in part. What 
happens to the material particles, we see : they be- 
come detached from the organizing principle, and 
relapse into simply mechanical and chemical con- 
ditions. What has happened to that organizing 
principle we neither see nor know ; and we have 
absolutely no reason at all for saying that it has 
ceased to exist. 

This is as true of plants and of animals as of 
men ; and there is no reason for supposing that 
when these die their principle of life is ended. It 
probably has reached a crisis, which consists in 
the putting on of new forms and ascending into 
a higher order of organized existence. 



APROPOS OF TYNDALL 1 

We have all read in our " Vicar of Wakefield " 
the famous speech made by the venerable and 
learned Ephraim Jenkinson to good Dr. Prim- 
rose : " The cosmogony, or creation of the world, 
has puzzled philosophers in all ages. Sanchonia- 
thon, Manetho, Berosus, and Ocellus Lucanus 
have all attempted it in vain," etc. But we hardly 
expected to have this question of cosmogony re- 
opened by an eminent scientist in an address to 
the British Association. What " Sanchoniathon, 
Manetho, Berosus, and Ocellus Lucanus have all 
attempted in vain" Professor Tyndall has not 
only discussed before a body of men learned in 
the physical sciences, but has done it in such a 
manner as to rouse two continents to a new inter- 
est in the question. One party has immediately 
accused him of irreligion and infidelity, while an- 
other has declared his statements innocent if not 
virtuous. But the question which has been least 
debated is, What has the professor really said ? 
or, Has he said anything ? 

The celebrated sentence which has occasioned 
this excitement is as follows : — 

1 The Galaxy, December, 1874. 






APROPOS OF TYNDALL 129 

" Abandoning all disguise, the confession that I 
feel bound to make before you is, that I prolong 
the vision backward across the boundary of the 
experimental evidence, and discern in that matter 
which we in our ignorance, and notwithstanding 
our professed reverence for its Creator, have 
hitherto covered with opprobrium, the promise 
and potency of every form and quality of life." 

Does he, then, declare himself a materialist ? A 
materialist is one who asserts everything which 
exists to be matter, or an affection of matter. 
What, then, is matter, and how is that to be de- 
fined ? The common definition of matter is, that 
which is perceived by the senses, or the substance 
underlying sensible phenomena. By means of the 
senses we perceive such qualities or phenomena as 
resistance, form, color, perfume, sound. When- 
ever we observe these phenomena, whenever we 
see, hear, ta*ste, touch, or smell, we attribute the 
affections thus excited to an external substance, 
which we call matter. But we are aware of other 
phenomena which are not perceived by the senses, 
— such as thought, love, and will. We are as 
certain of their existence as we are of sensible 
phenomena. I am as sure of the reality of love 
as I am of the whiteness of chalk. By a law 
of our mind, whenever we perceive sensible phe- 
nomena, we necessarily attribute them to a sub- 
stance outside of ourselves, which we call matter. 
And by another law, or the same law, whenever 



130 APROPOS OF TYXDALL 

we perceive the phenomena of consciousness, we 
necessarily attribute them to a substance which we 
call soul, mind, or spirit. All that we know of 
matter, and all that we know of soul, is their phe- 
nomena, and as these are entirely different, we are 
obliged to assume that matter and mind are dif- 
ferent. Xone of the qualities or attributes of 
matter belong to mind, none of those of mind to 
matter. 

Does Tyndall deny this distinction ? Appar- 
ently not. He not only makes Bishop Butler de- 
clare, with unanswerable power, that materialism 
can never show any connection between molecular 
processes and the phenomena of consciousness, but 
he distinctly iterates this in his own person at the 
end of the address ; asserting that there is no 
fusion possible between the two classes of facts, 
those of sensation and those of consciousness. 
Professor Tyndall, then, in the famous sentence 
above quoted, does not declare himself a material- 
ist in the only sense in which the term has hitherto 
been used. He does not pretend that sensation, 
thought, emotion, and will are reducible, in the 
last analysis, to solidity, extension, divisibility, 
etc. ; he positively and absolutely denies this. 

When Tyndall, therefore, asserts that he dis- 
cerns in matter the promise and potency of every 
form and quality of life, he uses the word " mat- 
ter " in a new sense. He does not mean by it the 
underlying subject of sensible phenomena. It is 



APROPOS OF TYNDALL 131 

not the matter which we see, hear, touch, taste, 
and smell. What is it then? It is something 
beyond the limits of observation and experiment ; 
for he says that in order to discover it we must 
" prolong the vision backward across the boundary 
of the experimental evidence." In short, it is 
something which we know nothing about. It is a 
conjecture, an opinion, a theoretical matter. In 
another place he calls this imaginary substance " a 
cosmical life." This something, which shall be 
the common basis of the phenomena of sense and 
soul, not only is not known, but apparently is not 
knowable. For he assures us that the very at- 
tempt to understand this cosmical life which makes 
the connection between physical and mental phe- 
nomena, is "to soar in a vacuum," or " to try to 
lift one's self by his own waistband." 

Of course, then, the contents of the famous 
sentence are not science. It is not the great scien- 
tist, the profound observer of nature, the distin- 
guished experimentalist, who speaks to us in that 
sentence, but one who is theorizing, as we all have 
a right to theorize. We also, if we choose, may 
imagine some " cosmical life " behind both matter 
and soul, as the common origin of both, and call 
this life spirit. We shall then be thinking of 
exactly the same substance that Tyndall is think- 
ing of, only we give it another name. He has 
merely given another name to the great Being 
behind all the phenomena of body and soul, out of 



132 APROPOS OF TYNDALL 

which or whom all proceed. But to give another 
name to a fact is not to tell us anything more 
about it. All meaning having evaporated from the 
word " matter," the sentence loses its whole sig- 
nificance, and it appears that the alarming decla- 
ration asserts nothing at all ! In " abandoning all 
disguise " Tyndall has run little risk, for our 
analysis shows that he has not asserted anything 
except, perhaps, this, that there is, in his judg- 
ment, some unknown common basis in which mat- 
ter and mind both inhere. This assertion is not 
alarming nor dangerous, for it is only what has 
always been believed. 

As there is no materialism, in any known sense 
of that term, in the doctrine of this address, so 
likewise there is no atheism. In fact, in this same 
sentence Tyndall speaks of the " creator " of what 
he likes to call " matter " or " cosmical life." He 
objects strongly to a creator who works mechan- 
ically, and he seems to reprove Darwin for ad- 
mitting an original or primordial form, created 
at first by the Deity. " The anthropomorphism, 
which it seemed the object of Mr. Darwin to set 
aside, is as firmly associated with the creation of a 
few forms as with the creation of a multitude." 
In another passage he says : " Is there not a temp- 
tation to close to some extent with Lucretius, 
when he affirms that nature is seen to do all 
things spontaneously of herself without the med- 
dling of the gods? " But this last sentence shows 



APROPOS OF TYNDALL 133 

a singular vacillation in so clear a thinker as 
Tyndall. How can one close " to some extent " 
with such a statement as that of Lucretius ? Either 
the gods meddle, or they do not meddle. They 
can hardly be considered as meddling " to some ex- 
tent." In still another passage he contrasts the 
doctrine of evolution with the usual doctrine of 
creation, rejecting the last in favor of the other, 
because creation makes of God " an artificer, fash- 
ioned after the human model, and acting by bro- 
ken efforts, as man is seen to act." 

All these expressions are somewhat vague, im- 
plying, as it seems, a certain obscurity in Tyndall's 
own thought. But it is not atheism. His " cos- 
mical life " probably is exactly what Cudworth 
means by " plastic life." It is well known that 
Cudworth, whose great work is a confutation of 
all atheism, himself admits what he calls " a plas- 
tic nature " in the universe as a subordinate in- 
strument of divine Providence. Just as Tyndall 
objects to regarding the Deity as " an artificer," 
Cudworth objects to the "mechanic theists," who 
make the Deity act directly upon matter from 
without, by separate efforts, instead of pouring a 
creative and arranging life into nature. We can 
easily see that Cudworth, like Tyndall, would 
object to Darwin's one or two " primordial germs." 
His " plastic nature " is working everywhere and 
always, though under a divine guidance. It is " a 
life," and therefore incorporeal. It is an uncon- 



134 



APROPOS OF TYNBALL 



scions life, which acts, not knowingly, but fatally. 
Man, according to Cud worth, partakes of this life 
from the life of the universe, just as he partakes 
of heat and cold from the heat and cold of the 
universe. Thus Cudworth, believing in some such 
" cosmical life " as Tyndall imagines, conceives it 
as being itself the organ and instrument of the 
Deity. Tyndall, therefore, though less clear in 
his statements than Cudworth, is not logically 
involved in atheism by those statements, unless we 
implicate in the same condemnation the writer 
whose vast work constitutes the fullest arsenal of 
weapons against all the forms of atheism. 

Unfortunately, however, Tyndall does not come 
to any clearness on this point, which in one pos- 
sessing such a lucidity of intellect must be occa- 
sioned by his leaving his own domain of science 
and venturing into this metaphysical world, with 
which he is not so familiar. His acquaintance 
with the history of these studies seems not to be 
extensive. For example, he attributes to Herbert 
Spencer, as if he were the discoverer, what both 
Hobbes and Descartes had already stated, that 
there is no necessary resemblance between our sen- 
sations and the external objects from which they 
are derived. In regard to a belief in God, he tells 
us that in his weaker moments he loses it, or that 
it becomes clouded and dim, but that when he is 
at his best he accepts it most fully. This belief, 
therefore, is not with Tyndall a matter of convic- 



APROPOS OF TYNBALL 135 

tion, founded on reason, but a question of moods. 
No wonder, then, that he relegates religion to the 
region of sentiment, and declares that it has no- 
thing to do with knowledge. It must not touch 
any question of cosmogony, or, if it does, must " sub- 
mit to the control of science " in that field. But 
what has science to do with cosmogony? Science 
rests on observation of facts ; but our professor 
tells us that he obtains his great cosmological idea 
of " a cosmical life " by prolonging his vision back- 
ward " across the boundary of the experimental evi- 
dence." Such science as this, which is based on 
no experience, and is incapable of verification, has 
hardly the right to warn religious belief away from 
any field. 

Tyndall seems a little astray in making crea- 
tion and evolution contradictory and incompatible. 
Evolution, he tells us, is the manifestation of a 
power wholly inscrutable to the intellect of man. 
We know that God is, — that is, we know it in our 
better moods, — but what God is, we cannot ever 
know. At all events we must not consider him as 
a Creator. " Two courses," says Tyndall, " and 
only two, are possible. Either let us open our 
doors freely to the conception of creative acts, or, 
abandoning them, let us radically change our no- 
tions of matter." His objections to the idea of a 
Creator appear to be (1) that it is " derived, not 
from the study of Nature, but from the observation 
of men ; " and (2) that it represents the Deity " as 



136 APBOPOS OF TYNBALL 

an artificer, fashioned after a human model, and 
acting by broken efforts as man is seen to act." 

Are these objections sound? When we study- 
man, are we not then also studying Nature ? Is 
not man himself the highest manifestation of Na- 
ture ? If so, and if we see the quality of any 
power best in its highest and fullest operations, 
we can study the nature of God best by looking 
into our own. We should, in fact, know very little 
of Nature if we did not look within as well as with- 
out. Tyndall justly demands unlimited freedom of 
investigation in the pursuit of science. But whence 
came this very idea of freedom except from the 
human mind? Nothing in the external world is 
free ; all is fatal. Such ideas as cause, force, sub- 
stance, law, unity, ideality, are not observed in the 
outward world — they are given by the activity of 
the mind itself. Subtract these from our thought, 
and we should know very little of Nature or its 
origin. 

No doubt the idea of a Creator, and of one per- 
fect in wisdom, power, and goodness, is derived by 
man from his own mind. But it is not necessary 
that such a Creator should be an " artificer," or 
proceed by " broken efforts." He may act by 
evolution, or processes of development. He may 
create perpetually, by a life flowing from himself 
into all things. He may create the universe anew 
at every moment — not as a man lights a torch 
with a match and then goes away, but as the sun 



APEOPOS OF TYNDALL 137 

creates his image in the water by a perpetual pro- 
cess. Thus God may be regarded as creating each 
animal and each plant, while he maintains the mys- 
terious force of development by which it grows 
from its egg or its seed. The essential idea of 
creation is an infinite cause, acting according to 
a perfect intelligence, for a perfect good. There 
is nothing, necessarily, of an artificer or of broken 
efforts in this. It is the very idea of divine crea- 
tion given in the New Testament. " From whom, 
and through whom, and to whom, are all things." 
" In him, we live, and move, and have our being." 
The theist may well accept the view given by 
Goethe, in his little poem, " Gott, Gemiith, und 
Welt." 

1 ' What kind of God would He be who only pushes the universe 
from without ? 

Who lets the All of Things run round and round on his finger ? 

It becomes him far better to move the universe from within, 

To take Nature up into Himself, to let Himself down into Na- 
ture, 

So that whatever lives, and moves, and has its being in Him 

Never loses His power, never misses His spirit." 

Such a conception of God, as a perpetual Creator, 
is essential to the intellectual rest of the human 
mind, and it is painful to see the irresolution of 
Professor Tyndall in regard to it. " Clear and 
confident as Jove " in the domain which is his own, 
where his masterly powers of observation, discrimi- 
nation, and judgment leave him without a peer, 
he seems shorn of his strength on entering this 



138 APROPOS OF TYNBALL 

field of metaphysics. He lias warned theology not 
to trespass on the grounds of science ; or, if she 
enters them, to submit to science as her superior. 
Theology has been in the habit of treating science 
in the same supercilious way ; telling her that she 
was an intruder if she ventured to discuss ques- 
tions of psychology or religion. This is equally 
unwise on either part. Theologians should be glad 
when men of science become seriously interested 
in these great questions of the Whence and the 
Whither. The address of Professor Tyndall is ex- 
cellent in its intention as well as in its candid and 
manly treatment of the subject. Its indecision 
and indistinctness are probably due to his having 
accepted too implicitly the guidance of Spencer, 
thus assuming that religious truth is unknowable, 
that creation is impossible, and that only pheno- 
mena can become objects of knowledge. " Insolu- 
ble mystery " is therefore his final answer to the 
questions he has himself raised. 

Goethe is wiser when he follows the Apostle 
Paul, and regards the Deity as " the fullness which 
filleth all in all." There is no unity to thought, 
and* no hope for scientific progress, more than for 
moral culture, unless we see intelligence at the 
centre, intelligence on the circumference of being. 
To place an impenetrable darkness instead of an 
unclouded light on the throne of the universe, 
is to throw a shadow over the Creation. 

We say that there is no unity in thought with- 



APROPOS OF TYNDALL 139 

out this conviction. The only real unity we know 
in the world is our own. All we see around us, in- 
cluding our own body, is divisible, subject to alter- 
ation and change. Only the ego, or soul, is con- 
scious of a perfect unity in a perpetual identity. 
Unless we can attribute to the source of all being 
a similar personal unity, there can be no coherence 
to science, but it must forever remain fragmentary 
and divided. This is what we mean by asserting 
the personality of Deity. This idea reaches what 
Lord Bacon calls "the vertical point of natural 
philosophy " or " the summary law of Nature," 
and constitutes, as he declares, " the union of all 
things in a perpetual and uniform law." 

And unless we can recognize in the ultimate 
fountain of being an intelligent purpose, the mean- 
ing of the universe departs. Without intelligence 
in the cause there is none in the effect. Then the 
world has no meaning, life no aim. The universe 
comes out of darkness, and is plunging into dark- 
ness again. 

Take away from the domain of knowledge the 
idea of a creating and presiding intelligence, and 
there remains no motive for science itself. Profes- 
sor Tyndall is sagacious enough to see and candid 
enough to admit that " without moral force to whip 
it into action the achievements of the intellect 
would be poor indeed," and that " science itself 
not unfrequently derives motive power from ultra- 
scientific sources." Faith in God, as an intelli- 



140 APROPOS OF TYNDALL 

gent creator and ruler of the world, has awakened 
enthusiasm for scientific investigation among both 
the Aryan and the Semitic races. 

The purest and highest form of monotheism 
is that of Christianity ; and in Christendom has 
science made its largest progress. Not by martyrs 
for science, but by martyrs for religion, has the 
human mind been emancipated. Mr. Tyndall says 
of scientific freedom, " We fought and won our 
battle even in the middle ages." But the heroes 
of intellectual liberty have been the heroes of 
faith. Hundreds of thousands have died for a 
religious creed ; but how many have died for a 
scientific theory? Luther went to Worms, and 
maintained his opinions there in defiance of the 
anathemas of the church and the ban of the empire, 
but Galileo denied his most cherished convictions 
on his knees. Galileo was as noble a character as 
Luther ; but science does not create the texture of 
soul which makes so many martyrs in all the reli- 
gious sects of Christendom. Let the doctrine of 
cosmical force supplant our faith in the Almighty, 
and in a few hundred years science would probably 
fade out of the world from pure inanition. The 
world would probably not care enough for any- 
thing to care for science. The light of eternity 
must fall on this our human and earthly life, to 
arouse the soul to a living and permanent interest 
even in things seen and temporal. 

Professor Tyndall says : " Whether the views of 



APROPOS OF TYNDALL 141 

Lucretius, Darwin, and Spencer are right or wrong, 
we claim the freedom to discuss them. The ground 
which they cover is scientific ground." 

It is not only a right, but a duty to examine 
these theories, since they are held seriously and 
urged earnestly by able men. But we must doubt 
whether they ought to claim the authority of 
science. They are proposed by scientific men, and 
they refer to scientific subjects. But these theo- 
ries, in their present development, belong to meta- 
physics rather than to science. Science consists, 
first, of observation of facts ; secondly, of laws 
inferred from those facts ; and thirdly, of a veri- 
fication of those laws by new observation and ex- 
periment. That which cannot be verified is no 
part of science ; astronomy is a science, since every 
eclipse and occultation verifies its laws ; geology 
is a science, since every new observation of the 
strata and their contents accords with the estab- 
lished part of the system ; chemistry is a science 
for the same reason. But Darwin's theory of the 
transformation of species by natural selection is as 
yet unverified. " There is no evidence of a direct 
descent of earlier from later species in the geolo- 
gical succession of animals." So says Agassiz, and 
on this point his testimony can hardly be im- 
peached. Professor W'. Thompson, another good 
geological authority, says : " In successive geologi- 
cal formations, although new species are constantly 
appearing, and there is abundant evidence of 



142 APROPOS OF TYNDALL 

progressive change, no single case has yet been 
observed of one species passing through a series of 
inappreciable modifications into another." Neither 
has any such change taken place within historic 
times, for the animals and plants found in the 
tombs of Egypt are " identical, in all respects," 
says M. Quatrefages, " with those now existing." 
He adds the opinion, after a very careful and can- 
did examination of the hypothesis of Darwin, that 
"the theory and the facts do not agree." Not 
being verified, then, this theory is not yet science, 
but an unverified mental hypothesis, that is, meta- 
physics. 

It is important that this should be distinctly 
said, for when men eminent in science propound 
new theories, these theories themselves are apt to 
be regarded as science, and those who oppose them 
are accused of being opposed to science. This is 
the tendency which Professor Tyndall has so justly 
described in this very address : " When the human 
mind has achieved greatness and given evidence of 
power in any domain, there is a tendency to credit 
it with similar power in any other domain." Be- 
cause Tyndall is great in experimental science, 
many are apt to accept his cosmological conclu- 
sions. Because he is a great observer in natural 
history, his metaphysical theories are supposed to 
be supported by observation, and to rest on experi- 
ence. Professor Tyndall' s own address terminates, 
not in science, but nescience. It treats of a realm 



APROPOS OF TYNBALL 143 

of atoms and molecules whose existence science 
has never demonstrated, and attributes to them 
potencies which science has never verified. It is a 
system, not made necessary by the stringent con- 
straint of facts, but avowedly constructed in order 
to avoid the belief in an intelligent Creator, and a 
universe marked by the presence of design. His 
theory, he admits, no less than that of Darwin, 
was not constructed in the pure interests of truth 
for its own sake. There was another purpose in 
both, — to get rid of a theology of final causes, of a 
theology which conceives of God as a human ar- 
tificer. He wished to exclude religion from the 
field of cosmogony, and forbid it to intrude on the 
region of knowledge. Theologians have often been 
reproached for studying " with a purpose," but it 
seems that this is a frailty belonging not to theolo- 
gians only, but to all human beings who care a 
good deal for what they believe. 

Professor Tyndall accepts religious faith as an 
important element of human nature, but considers 
it as confined to the sentiments, and as not based 
in knowledge. He doubtless comes to this conclu- 
sion from following too implicitly the traditions of 
modern English psychology. These assume that 
knowledge comes only from without, through the 
senses, and never from within, through intuition. 
This prepossession, singularly English and insular, 
is thus stated by John Stuart Mill in his article on 
Coleridge. " Sensation, and the mind's conscious- 



144 APROPOS OP TYXDALL 

ness of its own acts, are not only the exclusive 
sources, but the sole materials of our knowledge. 
There is no knowledge a priori; no truths cogniz- 
able by the mind's inward light, and grounded on 
intuitive evidence." These views have been de- 
veloped in England by the two Mills, Herbert 
Spencer, Bain, and others, who have made great 
efforts to show how sensations may be transformed 
into thoughts : how association of ideas may have 
developed instincts : how hereditary impressions, 
repeated for a million years, may at last have 
taken on the aspect of necessary truths. In short, 
they have laid out great labor and ingenuity in 
proving that a sensation may, very gradually, be 
transformed into a thought. 

But all this labor is probably a waste of time 
and of intellectual power. The attempt at turn- 
ing sensation into thought only results in turning 
thought into sensation. It is an error that we 
only know what we perceive through the senses, 
or transform by the action of the mind. It is not 
true that we only know that of which we can form 
a sensible image. We know the existence of the 
soul as certainly as that of the body. We know 
the infinite and the eternal as well as we know the 
finite and temporal. TTe know substance, cause, 
immortal beauty, absolute truth, as surely as the 
flitting phenomena which pass within the sphere 
of sensational experience. These convictions be- 
long, not to the sphere of sentiment and emotion, 



APROPOS OF TYNBALL 145 

but to that of knowledge. It is because they 
show us realities and not imaginations, that they 
nerve the soul to such vast efforts in the sphere of 
morals, literature, and religion. 

The arguments against the independent exist- 
ence of the soul which Tyndall puts into the 
mouth of his Lucretian disciple are not difficult to 
answer. " You can form no picture of the soul," 
he says. No ; and neither can we form a mental 
picture of love or hate, of right and wrong, or 
even of bodily pain and pleasure. " If localized 
in the body, the soul must have form." Must a 
pain, localized in the finger, have form ? " When 
a leg is amputated, in which part does the soul 
reside? " We answer, that the soul resides in the 
body, with reduced power. Its instrument is less 
perfect than before — like a telescope which has 
lost a lens. " If consciousness is an essential at- 
tribute of the soul, where is the soul when con- 
sciousness ceases by the depression of the brain ? " 
Is there any difficulty, we reply, in supposing that 
the soul may pass sometimes into a state of torpor, 
when its instrument is injured ? A soul may 
sleep, and so be unconscious, without being dead. 
" The diseased brain may produce immorality : 
can the reason control it ? If not, what is the use 
of the reason?" To this we answer that the soul 
may lose its power with a diseased body; but 
when furnished w T ith another and better body, it 
will regain it. " If you regard the body only as 



146 APROPOS OF TYNDALL 

an instrument, you will neglect to take care of it." 
Does the astronomer neglect to take care of his 
telescope ? 

These answers to the Lucretian may be far 
from complete ; but they are at least as good as 
the objections. The soul, no doubt, depends on 
the body, and cannot do its work well when the 
body is out of order ; but does that prove it to be 
the result of the body ? If so, the same argument 
would prove the carpenter to be the result of his 
box of tools, and the organist to be the result of 
his organ. The organist draws sweet music from 
his instrument. But as his organ grows old, or is 
injured by the weather, or the pipes crack, and the 
pedals get out of order r the music becomes more 
and more imperfect. At last the instrument is 
wholly ruined, and the music wholly ceases. Is t 
then, the organist dead, or was he only the result 
of the organ ? " Without phosphorus, no thought," 
say the materialists. True. So, "without the 
organ, no music." Just as in addition to the 
musical instrument we need a performer, so in 
addition to the brain we need a soul. 

There are two worlds of knowledge, — the out- 
ward world, which is perceived through the senses, 
and which belongs to physical science, and the 
inward world, perceived by the nobler reason, and 
from which a celestial light streams in, irradiating 
the mind through all its powers. Religion and 
science are not opposed, though different ; their 



APROPOS OF TYNDALL 147 

spheres are different, though not to be divided. 
Each is supreme in its own region, but each needs 
the help of the other in order to do its own work 
well. Professor Tyndall claims freedom of dis- 
cussion and inquiry for himself and his scientific 
brethren, and says he will oppose to the death any 
limitation of this liberty. He need not be anxious 
on this point. Religious faith has already fought 
this battle, and won for science as well as for it- 
self perfect liberty of thought. The Protestant 
churches may say, " With a great sum obtained 
we this freedom." By the lives of its confessors 
and the blood of its martyrs has it secured for all 
men to-day equal rights of thought and speech. 
What neither Copernicus, Kepler, nor Galileo 
could do was accomplished by the courage of 
Martin Luther, John Calvin, John Knox, and 
Oliver Cromwell. 

And now the freedom they obtained by such 
sacrifices we inherit and enjoy : " We are free- 
born." We may be thankful that in most coun- 
tries to-day no repression nor dictation prevents 
any man from expressing his inmost thought. 
We are glad that the most rabid unbelief and 
extreme denial can be spoken calmly in the open 
day. This is one great discovery of modern times, 
that errors lose half their influence when openly 
uttered. We owe this discovery to the Reforma- 
tion. The reformers made possible a toleration 
much larger than their own; unwittingly, while 



148 APROPOS OF TYNBALL 

seeking freedom for their own thoughts, they won 
the same freedom for others, who went farther 
than they. They builded better than they knew. 

Professor Tyndall's address is tranquil yet earn- 
est, modest, and manly. But its best result is, that 
it shows us the impotence of the method of sensa- 
tion to explain the mystery of the universe. It 
has shown us clearly the limitations of " the under- 
standing judging by sense " — shown that it sees 
our world clearly, but is blind to the other. It 
can tell every blade of grass, and name every 
mineral ; but it stands helpless and hopeless be- 
fore the problem of being. Science and religion 
may each say with the apostle, " We know in part 
and prophesy in part." Together and united, 
they may one day see and know the whole. 



LAW AND DESIGN IN NATURE 1 

In the paper which opens this discussion on 
"Law and Design in Nature," Prof essor Newcomb 
announces in a single sentence a proposition, the 
truth or falsehood of which, he tells us, is " the sole 
question presented for discussion in the present 
series of papers." 

But, as soon as we examine this proposition, we 
find that it contains not one sole question, but 
three. The three are independent of each other, 
and do not necessarily stand or fall together. They 
are these : — 

1. " The whole course of Nature, considered as 
a succession of phenomena, is conditioned solely 
by antecedent causes." 

2. In the action of these causes, " no regard to 
consequences is traceable." 

3. And no regard to consequences is " necessary 
to foresee the phenomena." 

Of these three propositions I admit the truth 
of the first ; deny the truth of the second ; and, 
for want of space, and because of its relative un- 
importance, leave the third unexamined. 

1 Symposium in the North American Review, May, 1879. 



150 LAW AND DESIGN IN NATURE 

The first proposition is so evidently true, and 
so universally admitted, that it was hardly worth 
positing for discussion. It is merely affirming that 
every natural phenomenon implies a cause. The 
word " antecedent " is ambiguous, but, if it intends 
logical and not chronological antecedence, it is un- 
objectionable. So understood, we are merely asked 
if we can accept the law of universal causation ; 
which I suppose we shall all readily do, since this 
law is the basis of theology no less than of science. 
Without it, we could not prove the existence of 
the first cause. Professor Newcomb has divided 
us into two conflicting schools, one of theology 
and the other of science. Taking my place in the 
school of theology, I think I may safely assert for 
my brethren that on this point there is no conflict, 
but that we all admit the truth of the law of uni- 
versal causation. It will be noticed that Professor 
Newcomb has carefully worded his statement, so 
as not to confine us to physical causes, nor even 
to exclude supernatural causes from without, work- 
ing into the nexus of natural laws. He does not 
say " antecedent physical causes," nor does he say 
" causes which have existed from the beginning." 

Admitting thus the truth of the first proposition, 
I must resolutely deny that of the second ; since, 
by accepting it, I should surrender the very cause 
I wish to defend, namely, that we can perceive 
design in Nature. Final causes are those which 
" regard consequences." The principle of finality 



LAW AND DESIGN IN NATURE 151 

is defined by M. Janet (in his recent exhaustive 
work, " Les Causes finales ") as " the present de- 
termined by the future." One example of the way 
in which we can trace in Nature " a regard to con- 
sequences " is so excellently stated by this eminent 
philosopher that we will introduce it here : " Con- 
sider what is implied in the egg of a bird. In the 
mystery and night of incubation there comes, by 
the combination of an incredible number of causes, 
a living machine within the egg. It is absolutely 
separated from the external world, but every part 
is related to some future use. The outward physi- 
cal world which the creature is to inhabit is wholly 
divided by impenetrable veils from this internal 
laboratory ; but a preestablished harmony exists 
between them. Without, there is light ; within, 
an optical machine adapted to it. Without, there 
is sound ; within, an acoustic apparatus. Without, 
are vegetables and animals ; within, organs for 
their reception and assimilation. Without, is air ; 
within, lungs with which to breathe it. Without, 
is oxygen ; within, blood to be oxygenized. With- 
out, is earth ; within, feet are being made to walk 
on it. Without, is the atmosphere ; within, are 
wings with which to fly through it. Now imagine 
a blind and idiotic workman, alone in a cellar, who 
simply by moving his limbs to and fro should be 
found to have forged a key capable of opening the 
most complex lock. If we exclude design, this is 
what Nature is supposed to be doing." 



152 LAW AND DESIGN IN NATURE 

That design exists in Nature, and that earthly- 
phenomena actually depend on final causes as well 
as on efficient causes, appears from the industry of 
man. Man is certainly a part of Nature, and those 
who accept evolution must regard him as the high- 
est development resulting from natural processes. 
Now, all over the earth, from morning till even- 
ing, men are acting for ends. " Regard to conse- 
quences is traceable " in all their conduct. They 
are moved by hope and expectation. They devise 
plans, and act for a purpose. From the savage 
hammering his flint arrowheads, up to a Shake- 
speare composing " Hamlet," a Columbus seeking 
a new way to Asia, or a Paul converting Europe 
to a Syrian religion, human industry is a constant 
proof that a large part of the course of Nature on 
this earth is the result of design. And, as man 
develops into higher stages, this principle of design 
rises also from the simple to the complex, taking 
ever larger forms. A ship, for instance, shows 
throughout the adaptation of means to ends, by 
which complex adaptations produce a unity of 
result. 

And that there is no conflict between the action 
of physical causes and final causes is demonstrated 
by the works of man, since they all result from the 
harmonious action of both. In studying human 
works we ask two questions, — " How ? " and 
" Why ? " We ask, " What is it for ? " and " How 
is it done ? " The two lines of inquiry run paral- 



LAW AND DESIGN IN NATURE 153 

lei, and without conflict. So, in studying the 
works of Nature, to seek for design does not ob- 
struct the investigation of causes, and may often 
aid it. Thus Harvey is said to have been led to 
the discovery of the circulation of the blood by 
seeking for the use of the valves of the veins and 
heart. 

The human mind is so constituted that, when- 
ever it sees an event, it is obliged to infer a cause. 
So, whenever it sees adaptation, it infers design. 
It is not necessary to know the end proposed, or 
who were the agents. Adaptation itself, implying 
the use of means, leads us irresistibly to infer in- 
tention. We do not know who built Stonehenge, 
or some of the pyramids, or what they were built 
for ; but no one doubts that they were the result 
of design. This inference is strengthened if we 
see combination toward an end, and preparation 
made beforehand for a result which comes after- 
ward. From preparation, combination, and adap- 
tation, we are led to believe in the presence of hu- 
man design even where we did not before know 
of the presence of human beings. A few rudely 
shaped stones, found in a stratum belonging to the 
Quaternary period, in which man had before not 
been believed to exist, changed that opinion. Those 
chipped flints showed adaptation ; from adaptation 
design was inferred ; and design implied the pre- 
sence of man. 

Now, we find in Nature, especially in the organ- 



154 LAW AND DESIGN IN NATURE 

ization and instincts of animals, myriads of similar 
instances of preparation, combination, and adapta- 
tion. Two explanations only of this occurred to 
antiquity, — design and chance. Socrates, Plato, 
and others, were led by such facts to infer the 
creation of the world by an intelligent author — 
41 ille opifex rerum.' 9 Democritus, Epicurus, and 
Lucretius, ascribed it to the fortuitous concourse 
of atoms. But modern science has expelled chance 
from the universe, and substituted law. Laplace, 
observing forty-three instances in the solar system 
of planets and their satellites revolving on their 
axes or moving in their orbits, from west to east, 
declared that this could not be a mere coincidence. 
Chance, therefore, being set aside, the question 
takes another form : " Did the cosmos that we see 
come by design or by law? " 

But does this really change the question? 
Granting, for example, the truth of the theory 
of the development of all forms of life, under the 
operation of law, from a primal cell, we must then 
ask, " Did these laws come by chance or by de- 
sign ? " It is not possible to evade that issue. If 
the universe resulted from non-intelligent forces, 
those forces themselves must have existed as the 
result of chance or of intelligence. If you put out 
the eyes, you leave blindness ; if you strike intelli- 
gence out of the creative mystery, you leave blind 
forces, the result of accident. Whatever is not 
from intelligence is from accident. To substitute 



LAW AND DESIGN IN NATURE 155 

law for chance is merely removing the difficulty a 
little further back ; it does not solve it. 

To eliminate interventions from the universe is 
not to remove design. The most profound theists 
have denied such interruptions of the course of Na- 
ture. Leibnitz is an illustrious example of this. 
Janet declares him to have been the true author of 
the theory of evolution, by his " Law of Conti- 
nuity," of " Insensible Perceptions," and of " Infin- 
itely Small Increments." Yet he also fully believed 
in final causes. Descartes, who objected to some 
teleological statements, believed that the Creator 
imposed laws on chaos by which the world emerged 
into a cosmos. We know that existing animals 
are evolved by a continuous process from eggs, and 
existing vegetables by a like process from seeds. 
No one ever supposed that there was less of design 
on this account in their creation. So, if all exist- 
ing things came at first by a like process from a 
single germ, it would not argue less, but far more, 
of design in the universe. 

The theory of " natural selection " does not 
enable us to dispense with final causes. This 
theory requires the existence of forces working 
according to the law of heredity and the law of 
variation, together with a suitable environment. 
But whence came this arrangement, by which a 
law of heredity was combined with a law of varia- 
tion, and both made to act in a suitable environ- 
ment ? Here we find again the three marks of a 



156 LAW AND DESIGN IN NATUBE 

designing intelligence : preparation, combination, 
adaptation. That intelligence which combines and 
adapts means to ends is merely remanded to the 
initial step of the process, instead of being allowed 
to act continuously along the whole line of evolu- 
tion. Even though you can explain by the action 
of mechanical forces the whole development of the 
solar system and its contents from a nebula, you 
have only accumulated all the action of a creative 
intelligence in the nebula itself. Because I can 
explain the mechanical process by which a watch 
keeps time, I have not excluded the necessity of a 
watchmaker. Because, walking through my neigh- 
bor's grounds, I come upon a water-ram pumping 
up water by a purely mechanical process, I do not 
argue that this mechanism makes the assumption 
of an inventor superfluous. In human industry 
we perceive a power capable of using the blind 
forces of Nature for an intelligent end ; which pre- 
pares beforehand for the intended result ; which 
combines various conditions suited to produce it, 
and so creates order, system, use. But we observe 
in Nature exactly similar examples of order, method, 
and system, resulting from a vast number of com- 
binations, correlations, and adaptations of natural 
forces. Man himself is such a result. He is an 
animal capable of activity, happiness, progress. 
But innumerable causes are combined and har- 
monized in his physical frame, each necessary to 
this end. As the human intelligence is the only 



LAW AND DESIGN IN NATURE 157 

i 
power we know capable of accomplishing such 

results, analogy leads us to assume that a similar 
intelligence presides over the like combinations of 
means to ends in Nature. If any one questions 
the value of this argument from analogy, let him 
remember how entirely we rely upon it in all the 
business of life. We know only the motives which 
govern our own actions ; but we infer by analogy 
that others act from similar motives. Knowing 
that we ourselves combine means designed to effect 
ends, when we see others adapting means to ends, 
we assume that they act also with design. Hence 
we have a right to extend the argument further 
and higher. 

The result of what I have said is this : The 
phenomena of the universe cannot be satisfacto- 
rily explained except by the study both of efficient 
causes and of final causes. Routine scientists, 
confining themselves to the one, and routine theo- 
logians, confining themselves to the other, may 
suppose them to be in conflict. But men of larger 
insight, like Leibnitz, Newton, Descartes, and 
Bacon, easily see the harmony between them. 
Like Hegel they say: "Nature is no less artful 
than powerful ; it attains its end while it allows 
all things to act according to their constitution ; " 
or they declare with Bacon that " the highest link 
of Nature's chain is fastened to the foot of Jupi- 
ter's chair." But the belief in final causes does 
not imply belief in supernatural intervention, nor 



158 LAW AND DESIGN IN NATURE 

of any disturbance in the continuity of natural 
processes. It means that Nature is pervaded by 
an intelligent presence; that mind is above and 
around matter ; that mechanical laws are them- 
selves a manifestation of some providing wisdom, 
and that when we say Nature we also say God. 1 

1 In this brief paper it is not possible even to allude to the 
objections which have been brought against the doctrine of final 
causes. For these objections, and the answers to them, I would 
refer the reader to the work of Janet, before mentioned. 



HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPH- 
ICAL 



THE TWO CARLYLES, OR CARLYLE PAST 
AND PRESENT 1 

In Thomas Carlyle's earlier days, when he fol- 
lowed a better inspiration than his present, — 
when his writings were steeped, not in cynicism, 
but in the pure human love of his fellow beings, 
— in the days when he did not worship Force, but 
Truth and Goodness, — in those days, it was the 
fashion of critics to pass the most sweeping cen- 
sures on his writings as " affected," " unintelligi- 
ble," " extravagant." But he worked his way on, 
in spite of that superficial criticism, — he won for 
himself an audience ; he gained renown ; he be- 
came authentic. JVow, the same class of critics 
admire and praise whatever he writes. For the 
rule with most critics is that of the bully in school 
and college, — to tyrannize over the new boys, to 
abuse the strangers, but to treat with respect who- 
ever has bravely fought his way into a recognized 
position. Carlyle has fought his way into the posi- 
tion of a great literary chief, — so now he may be 
ever so careless, ever so willful, and he will be spo- 
ken of in high terms by all monthlies and quarter- 
lies. When he deserved admiration, he was treated 

1 The Christian Examiner, September 1864. 



162 THE TWO CAELYLES 

with cool contempt ; now that he deserves the sharp- 
est criticism, not only for his false moral position, 
but for his gross literary sins, the critics treat him 
with deference and respect. 

But let us say beforehand that we can never 
write of Thomas Carlyle with bitterness. We 
have received too much good from him in past 
days. He is our " Lost Leader," but we have 
loved and honored him as few men were ever loved 
and honored. It is therefore with tenderness, and 
not any cold, indifferent criticism, that we find 
fault with him now. We shall always be grateful 
to the real Carlyle, the old Carlyle of " Sartor Re- 
sartus," of the " French Revolution," of the " Life 
of Schiller," of " Heroes and Hero- Worship," and 
of that long and noble series of articles in the 
Edinburgh, Foreign Review, Westminster, and 
Frazer, each of which illuminated some theme, and 
threw the glory of genius over whatever his mind 
touched or his pencil drew. 

Carlyle's " Frederick the Great " 1 seems to us a 
badly written book. Let us consider the volume 
containing the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth 
chapters. Nothing in these chapters is brought 
out clearly. When we have finished the book, the 
mind is filled with a confusion of vague images. 

1 History of Friedrich the Second, called Frederick the Great, 
by Thomas Carlyle. In four volumes. Harper and Brothers, 

1864. 



THE TWO CAELYLJES 163 

We know that Mr. Carlyle is not bound to " pro- 
vide^ with brains " as well as with a history, but 
neither was he so bound in other days. Yet no 
such confusion was left after reading the " French 
Revolution. " How brilliantly distinct was every 
leading event, every influential person, every pa- 
thetic or poetic episode, in that charmed narrative ! 
Who can forget Carlyle's account of the " Me- 
nads," the King's " Flight to Varennes," the Con- 
stitutions that " would not march," the " Septem- 
ber Massacres," " Charlotte Corday," — every chief 
tragic movement, every grotesque episode, moving 
forward, distinct and clear, to the final issue, " a 
whiff of grapeshot " ? Is there anything like that 
in this confused " Frederick " ? 

Compare, for example, the chapters on Voltaire 
in the present volume with the article on Voltaire 
published in 1829. 

The sixteenth book is devoted to the ten years 
of peace which followed the second Silesian war. 
These were from 1746 to 1756. The book con- 
tains fifteen chapters. Carlyle begins, in chapter 
i., by lamenting that there is very little to be 
known or said about these ten years. " Nothing 
visible in them of main significance but a crash of 
authors' quarrels, and the crowning visit of Vol- 
taire." Yet one would think that matter enough 
might be found in describing the immense activity 
of Friedrich, of which Macaulay says, " His exer- 
tions were such as were hardly to be expected 



164 THE TWO CABLYLES 

from a human body or a human mind." During 
these years Frederick brought a seventh part of 
his people into the army, and organized and drilled 
it under his own personal inspection, till it became 
the finest in Europe. He compiled a code of laws, 
in which he, among the first, abolished torture. 
He made constant journeys through his domin- 
ions, examining the condition of manufactures, 
arts, commerce, and agriculture. He introduced 
the strictest economy into the expenditures of the 
state. He indulged himself, indeed, in various 
architectural extravagances at Berlin and Pots- 
dam, — but otherwise saved every florin for his 
army. He wrote " Memoirs of the House of 
Brandenburg," and an epic poem on the " Art of 
War." But our author disdains to give us an 
account of these things. They are not picturesque, 
they can be told in only general terms, and Carlyle 
will tell us only what an eyewitness could see or a 
listener hear. Accordingly, instead of giving us 
an account of these great labors of his hero, he 
inserts (chapter ii.) " a peep at Voltaire and his 
divine Emilie," " a visit to Frederick by Marshal 
Saxe ; " (chapter iii.) a long account of Candi- 
date Linsenbarth's visit to the king ; " Sir Jonas 
Hanway stalks across the scene ; " the lawsuit of 
Voltaire about the Jew Hirsch ; " a demon news- 
writer gives an idea of Friedrich ; " the quarrel of 
Voltaire and Maupertuis ; " Friedrich is visible in 
Holland to the naked eye for some minutes." 



THE TWO CARLYLES 165 

This is very unsatisfactory. Reports of eyewit- 
nesses" are, no doubt, picturesque and valuable ; but 
so only on condition of being properly arranged, 
and tending, in their use, toward some positive 
result. Then the tone of banter, of irony, almost 
of persiflage, is discouraging. If the whole story 
of Friedrich is so unintelligible, uninteresting, or 
incommunicable, why take the trouble to write it ? 
The poco-curante air with which he narrates, as 
though it were of no great consequence whether he 
told his story or not, contrasts wonderfully with 
his early earnestness. Carlyle writes this history 
like a man thoroughly blase. Impossible for him 
to take any interest in it himself, — how, then, does 
he expect to interest us ? Has he not himself told 
us, in his former writings, that the man who 
proposes to teach others anything must be good 
enough to believe it first himself ? 

Here is the problem we have to solve. How 
came this change from the Carlyle of the Past to 
the Carlyle of the Present, — from Carlyle the 
universal believer to. Carlyle the universal skeptic, 
— from him to whom the world was full of wonder 
and beauty, to him who can see in it nothing but 
Force on the one side and Shams on the other ? 
What changed that tender, loving, brave soul into 
this hard cynic ? And how was it, as Faith and 
Love faded out of him, that the life passed from 
his thought, the glory from his pen, and the 
page, once alive with flashing ideas, turned into 



166 THE TWO CARLYLES 

this confused heap of rubbish, in which silver 
spoons, old shoes, gold sovereigns, and copper pen- 
nies are pitched out promiscuously, for the patient 
reader to sift and pick over as he can ? In read- 
ing the Carlyle of thirty years ago, we were like 
California miners, — come upon a rich placer, 
never before opened, where we could all become 
rich in a day. Now the reader of Carlyle is a 
chiffonier, raking in a heap of street dust for what- 
ever precious matters may turn up. 

To investigate this question is our purpose now, 
— and in doing so we w r ill consider, in succession, 
these two Carlyles. 

I. It was about the year 1830 that readers of 
books in this vicinity became aware of a new power 
coming up in the literary republic. Opinions con- 
cerning him varied widely. To some he seemed a 
Jack Cade, leader of rebels, foe to good taste and all 
sound opinions. Especially did his admiration for 
Goethe and for German literature seem to many 
preposterous and extravagant. It was said of 
these, that " the force of folly could no further 
go," — that they " constituted a burlesque too 
extravagant to be amusing." The tone of Carlyle 
was said to be of " unbounded assumption ; " his 
language to be " obscure and barbarous ; " his 
ideas composed of " extravagant paradoxes, fami- 
liar truths or familiar falsehoods ; " " wildest ex- 
travagance and merest silliness." 

But to others, and especially to the younger 



THE TWO CARLYLES 167 

men, this new writer came, opening up unknown 
wdrtehf of beauty and wonder. A strange influ- 
ence, unlike any other, attracted us to his writing. 
Before we knew his name, we knew him. We 
could recognize an article by our new author as 
soon as we opened the pages of the Foreign Re- 
view, Edinburgh, or Westminster, and read a few 
paragraphs. But it was not the style, though 
marked by a singular freedom and originality — 
not the tone of kindly humor, the good-natured 
irony, the happy illustrations brought from afar, 
— not the amount of literary knowledge, the fa- 
miliarity with German, French, Italian, Spanish 
literature, — not any or all of these which so be- 
witched us. We knew a young man who used to 
walk from a neighboring town to Boston every 
week, in order to read over again two articles by 
Carlyle in two numbers of the Foreign Review 
lying on a table in the reading-room of the Athe- 
naeum. This was his food, in the strength of 
which he could go a week, till hunger drove him 
back to get another meal at the same table. We 
knew other young men and young women who 
taught themselves German in order to read for 
themselves the authors made so luminous by this 
writer. Those were counted fortunate who pos- 
sessed the works of our author, as yet unpublished 
in America, — his " Life of Schiller," his " Ger- 
man Romance," his Review articles. What, then, 
was the charm, — whence the fascination? 



168 THE TWO CABLYLES 

To explain this we must describe a little the 
state of literature and opinion in this vicinity at 
the time when Carlyle's writings first made their 
appearance. 

Unitarianism and Orthodoxy had fought their 
battle, and were resting on their arms. Each had 
intrenched itself in certain positions, each had won 
to its side most of those who legitimately belonged 
to it. Controversy had done all it could, and had 
come to an end. Among the Unitarians, the so- 
called " practical preaching " was in vogue ; that 
is, ethical and moral essays, pointing out the good- 
ness of being good, and the excellence of what was 
called " moral virtue." There was, no doubt, a 
body of original thinkers and writers, — better 
thinkers and writers, it may be, than we have now, 
— who were preparing the way for another ad- 
vance. Channing had already unfolded his doc- 
trine of man, of which the central idea is, that 
human nature is not to be moulded by religion, 
but to be developed by it. Walker, Greenwood, 
Ware, and their brave associates, were conducting 
this journal with unsurpassed ability. But some- 
thing more was needed. The general character of 
preaching was not of a vitalizing sort. It was 
much like what Carlyle says of preaching in Eng- 
land at the same period : " The most enthusiastic 
Evangelicals do not preach a Gospel, but keep 
describing how it should and might be preached ; 
to awaken the sacred fire of faith is not their en- 



THE TWO CABLYLES 169 

dea^w^Jbut at most, to describe how faith shows 
and acts, and scientifically to distinguish true faith 
from false." It is " not the Love of God which is 
taught, but the love of the Love of God." 

According to this, God was outside of the world, 
at a distance from his children, and obliged to 
communicate with them in this indirect way, by 
breaking through the walls of natural law with an 
occasional miracle. There was no door by which 
he could enter into the sheepfold to his sheep. 
Miracles were represented, even by Dr. Channing, 
as abnormal, as " violations of the laws of nature ; " 
something, therefore, unnatural and monstrous, 
and not to be believed except on the best evidence. 
God could not be supposed to break through the 
walls of this house of nature, except in order to 
speak to his children on some great occasions. 
That he had done it, in the case of Christianity, 
could be proved by the eleven volumes of Dr. 
Lardner, which showed the Four Gospels to have 
been written by the companions of Christ, and not 
otherwise. 

The whole of this theory rested, it will be ob- 
served, on a sensuous system of mental philosophy. 
" All knowledge comes through the senses," was 
its foundation. Kevelation, like every other form 
of knowledge, must come through the senses. A 
miracle, which appeals to the sight, touch, hearing, 
is the only possible proof of a divine act. For, 
in the last analysis, all our theology rests on our 



170 THE TWO CABLYLES 

philosophy. Theology, being belief, must pro- 
ceed according to those laws of belief, whatever 
they are, which we accept and hold. The man 
who thinks that all knowledge comes through the 
senses must receive his theological knowledge also 
that way, and no other. This was the general 
opinion thirty or forty years ago ; hence this the- 
ory of Christianity, which supposes that God is 
obliged to break his own laws in order to com- 
municate it. 

But the result of this belief was harmful. It 
tended to make our religion formal, our worship 
a mere ceremony; it made real communication 
with God impossible; it turned prayer into a 
self -magnetizing operation ; it left us virtually 
" without God and hope in the world." Thanks 
to Him who never leaves himself without a witness 
in the human heart, this theory was often nullified 
in practice by the irrepressible instincts which it 
denied, by the spiritual intuitions which it ridi- 
culed. Even Professor Norton, its chief champion, 
had a heart steeped in the sweetest piety. Deny- 
ing, intellectually, all intuitions of God, Duty, 
and Immortality, his beautiful and tender hymns 
show the highest spiritual insight. Still it cannot 
be denied that this theory tended to dry up the 
fountains of religious faith in the human heart, 
and to leave us in a merely mechanical and unspirit- 
ualized world. 

Now the first voice which came to break this 



THE TWO CARLYLES 171 

enchantment was, to many, the voice of Thomas 
Carlyle. It needed for this end, it always needs, 
a man who could come face to face with Truth. 
Every great idol-breaker, every man who has de- 
livered the world from the yoke of Forms, has 
been one who was able to see the substance of 
things, who was gifted with the insight of realities. 
Forms of worship, forms of belief, at first the 
channels of life, through which the Living Spirit 
flowed into human hearts, at last became petrified, 
incrusted, choked. A few drops of the vital 
current still ooze slowly through them, and our 
parched lips, sucking these few drops, cling all the 
more closely to the form as it becomes less and 
less a vehicle of life. The poorest word, old and 
trite, is precious when there is no open vision. 
We do well continually to resort to the half-dead 
form, " till the day dawn, and the day-star arise in 
our hearts." 

But at last there comes a man capable of dis- 
pensing with the form, — a man endowed with a 
high degree of the intuitive faculty, — a born seer, 
a prophet, seeing the great realities of the universe 
with open vision. The work of such a man is to 
break up the old formulas and introduce new light 
and life. This work was done for the Orthodox 
thirty years ago by the writings of Coleridge ; for 
the Unitarians in this vicinity, by the writings of 
Thomas Carlyle. 

This was the secret of the enthusiasm felt for 



172 THE TWO CAELYLES 

Carlyle, in those days, by so many of the younger 
men and women. He taught us to look at reali- 
ties instead of names, at substance instead of sur- 
face, — to see God in the world, in nature, in life, 
in providence, in man, — to see divine truth and 
beauty and wonder everywhere around. He taught 
that the only organ necessary by which to see the 
divine in all things was sincerity, or inward truth. 
And so he enabled us to escape from the form into 
the spirit, he helped us to rise to that plane of 
freedom from which we could see the divine in the 
human, the infinite in the finite, God in man, 
heaven on earth, immortality beginning here, eter- 
nity pervading time. This made for us a new 
heaven and a new earth, a new religion and a new 
life. Faith was once more possible, a faith not 
bought by the renunciation of mature reason or 
the beauty and glory of the present hour. 

But all this was taught us by our new prophet, 
not by the intellect merely, but by the spirit in 
which he spoke. He did not seem to be giving us 
a new creed, so much as inspiring us with a new 
life. That which came from his experience went 
into ours. Therefore it might have been difficult, 
in those days, for any of his disciples to state what 
it was that they had learned from him. They had 
not learned his doctrine, — they had absorbed it. 
Hence, very naturally, came the imitations of 
Carlyle, which so disgusted the members of the 
old school. Hence the absurd Carlylish writing, 



THE TWO CABLYLES 173 

the feeBle imitations by honest, but weak disciples 
of the great master. It was a pity, but not un- 
natural, and it soon passed by. 

As Carlyle thus did his work, not so much 
by direct teaching as by an influence hidden in 
all that he said, it did not much matter on what 
subject he wrote, — the influence was there still. 
But his articles on Goethe were the most attrac- 
tive, because he asserted that in this patriarch of 
German literature he had found one who saw in 
all things their real essence, one whose majestic 
and trained intelligence could interpret to us in all 
parts of nature and life the inmost quality, the 
terza essenza, as the Italian Platonists called it, 
which made each itself. Goethe was announced 
as the prophet of Realism. He, it should seem, 
had perfectly escaped from words into things. He 
saw the world, not through dogmas, traditions, 
formulas, but as it was in itself, To him 

" the world's unwithered countenance 
Was fresh as on creation's day." 

Consider the immense charm of such hopes as 
these ! No wonder that the critics complained 
that the disciples of Carlyle were " insensible to 
ridicule." What did they care for the laughter, 
which seemed to them, in their enthusiasm, like 
" the crackling of thorns under the pot." Ridi- 
cule, in fact, never touches the sincere enthusiast. 
It is a good and useful weapon against affectation, 
but it falls, shivered to pieces, from the magic 



174 THE TWO CABLYLES 

breastplate of truth. No sincere person, at work 
in a cause which he knows to be important, ever 
minds being laughed at. 

But besides his admirable discussions of Goethe, 
Carlyle's " Life of Schiller " opened the portals of 
German literature, and made an epoch in biogra- 
phy and criticism. It was a new thing to read a 
biography written with such enthusiasm, — to find 
a critic who could really write with reverence and 
tender love of the poet whom he criticised. In- 
stead of taking his seat on the judicial bench, and 
calling his author up before him to be judged as 
a culprit, Carlyle walks with Schiller through the 
circles of his poems and plays, as Dante goes with 
Virgil through the Inferno and Paradiso. He 
accepts the great poet as his teacher and master, 1 
a thing unknown before in all criticism. It was 
supposed that a biographer would become a mere 
Boswell if he looked up to his hero, instead of 
looking down on him. It was not understood that 
it was that " angel of the world," Reverence, 
which had exalted even a poor, mean, vain fool, 
like Boswell, and enabled him to write one of the 
best books ever written. It was not his reverence 
for Johnson which made Boswell a fool, — his 
reverence for Johnson made him, a fool, capable of 
writing one of the best books of modern times. 

This capacity of reverence in Carlyle — this 

1 " Tu se' lo mio maestro, e '1 mfo autore, 
O degli altri poeti onore e lume." 



THE TWO CABLYLES 175 

power-of perceiving a divine, infinite quality in 
human souls — tinges all his biographical writing 
with a deep religious tone. He wrote of Goethe, 
Schiller, Bichter, Burns, Novalis, even Voltaire, 
with reverence. He could see their defects easily 
enough, he could playfully expose their weaknesses ; 
but beneath all was the sacred undertone of rever- 
ence for the divine element in each, — for that 
which God had made and meant them to be, and 
which they had realized more or less imperfectly 
in the struggle of life. The difference between 
the reverence of a Carlyle and that of a Boswell 
is, that one is blind and the other intelligent. The 
one worships his hero down to his shoes and stock- 
ings, the other distinguishes the divine idea from 
its weak embodiment. 

Two articles from this happy period — that on 
the " Signs of the Times " and that called " Char- 
acteristics " — indicate some of Carlyle's leading 
ideas concerning right thinking and right living. 
In the first, he declares the present to be an age 
of mechanism, — not heroic, devout, or philoso- 
phic. All things are done by machinery. " Men 
have no faith in individual endeavor or natu- 
ral force." "Metaphysics has become material." 
Government is a machine. All this he thinks 
evil. The living force is in the individual soul, — 
not mechanic, but dynamic. Religion is a calcula- 
tion of expediency, not an impulse of worship ; no 
thousand- voiced psalm from the heart of man to his 



176 THE TWO CARLYLES 

invisible Father, the Fountain of all goodness, 
beauty, and truth, but a contrivance by which a 
small quantum of earthly enjoyment may be ex- 
changed for a much larger quantum of celestial 
enjoyment. " Virtue is pleasure, is profit." "In 
all senses we worship and follow after power, which 
may be called a physical pursuit." (Ah, Carlyle 
of the Present ! does not that wand of thine old 
true self touch thee ?) " No man now loves truth, 
as truth must be loved, with an infinite love ; but 
only with a finite love, and, as it were, par amours" 

In the other article, " Characteristics," printed 
two years later, in 1831, he unfolds the doctrine of 
" Unconsciousness " as the sign of health in soul 
as well as body. He finds society sick every- 
where ; he finds its religion, literature, science, all 
diseased, yet he ends the article, as the other was 
ended, in hope of a change to something better. 

These two articles may be considered as an in- 
troduction to his next great work, " Sartor Eesar- 
tus," or the " Clothes-Philosophy." Here, in a 
vein of irony and genial humor, he unfolds his 
doctrine of substance and form. The object of all 
thought and all experience is to look through 
the clothes to the living beneath them. Accord- 
ing to his book, all human institutions are the 
clothing of society ; language is the garment of 
thought, the heavens and earth the time-vesture 
of the Eternal. So, too, are religious creeds and 
ceremonies the clothing of religion ; so are all sym- 



THE TWO CABLYLES 177 

bols the vesture of some idea ; so are the crown 
and sceptre the vesture of government. This book 
is the autobiography of a seeker for truth. In it 
he is led from the shows of things to their inner- 
most substance, and as in all his other writings, he 
teaches here also that sincerity, truthfulness, is the 
organ by which we are led to the solid rock of 
reality, which underlies all shows and shams. 

II. We now come to treat of Carlyle in his pre- 
sent aspect, — a much less agreeable task. We 
leave Carlyle the generous and gentle, for Carlyle 
the hard cynic. We leave him, the friend of man, 
lover of his race, for another Carlyle, advocate of 
negro slavery, worshiper of mere force, sneering 
at philanthropy, and admiring only tyrants, des- 
pots, and slaveholders. The change, and the steps 
which led to it, chronologically and logically, it is 
our business to scrutinize, — not a grateful occu- 
pation indeed, but possibly instructive and useful. 

Thomas Carlyle, after spending his previous life 
in Scotland, and from 1827 to 1834 in his solitude 
at Craigenputtoch, removed to London in the latter 
year, when thirty-eight years old. Since then he 
has permanently resided in London, in a house 
situated on one of the quiet streets running at 
right angles with the Thames. He came to Lon- 
don almost an unknown man ; he has there become 
a great name and power in literature. He has had 
for friends such men as John Stuart Mill, Sterling, 
Maurice, Leigh Hunt, Browning, Thackeray, and 



178 THE TWO CARLYLES 

Emerson. His " French Revolution " was pub- 
lished in 1837 ; " Sartor Resartus " (published 
in Frazer in 1833, and in Boston in a volume in 
1836) was put forth collectively in 1838 ; and 
in the same year his " Miscellanies " (also collected 
and issued in Boston in 1838) were published in 
London, in four volumes. " Chartism " was issued 
in 1839. He gave four courses of Lectures in 
Willis's rooms "to a select but crowded audience," 
in 1837, 1838, 1839, and 1840. Only the last of 
these — " Heroes and Hero-Worship " — was pub- 
lished. " Past and Present " followed in 1843, 
" Oliver Cromwell " in 1845. In 1850 he printed 
" Latter-Day Pamphlets," and subsequently his 
" Life of Sterling " (1851), and the four volumes, 
now issued, of " Frederick the Great." 

The first evidence of an altered tendency is per- 
haps to be traced in the " French Revolution." 
It is a noble and glorious book ; but, as one of his 
friendly critics has said, " its philosophy is con- 
temptuous and mocking, and it depicts the varied 
and gigantic characters which stalk across the 
scene, not so much as responsible and living mor- 
tals, as the mere mechanical implements of some 
tremendous and irresistible destiny." In " Heroes 
and Hero-Worship " the habit has grown of rever- 
ing mere will, rather than calm intellectual and 
moral power. The same thing is shown in " Past 
and Present," in " Cromwell," and in " Latter- 
Day Pamphlets," which the critic quoted above 



THE TWO CARLYLES 179 

\. 

says isT ■" only remarkable as a violent imitation of 
himself, and not of his better self." For the works 
of this later period, indeed, the best motto would 
be that verse from Daniel : " He shall exalt him- 
self, and magnify himself, and speak marvelous 
things ; neither shall he regard the God of his 
fathers, but in his stead shall he honor the God 
of Forces, a god whom his fathers knew not." 

Probably this apostasy from his better faith had 
begun, before this, to show itself in conversation. 
At least Margaret Fuller, in a letter dated 1846, 
finds herself in his presence admiring his bril- 
liancy, but " disclaiming and rejecting almost 
everything he said." " For a couple of hours," 
says she, " he was talking about poetry, and the 
whole harangue was one eloquent proclamation of 
the defects in his own mind." " All Carlyle's talk, 
another evening," says she, " was a defence of mere 
force, — success the test of right ; if people would 
not behave well, put collars round their necks ; 
find a hero, and let them be his slaves." " Maz- 
zini was there, and, after some vain attempts to 
remonstrate, became very sad. Mrs. Carlyle said 
to me, ' These are but opinions to Carlyle ; but to 
Mazzini, who has given his all, and helped bring 
his friends to the scaffold, in pursuit of such sub- 
jects, it is a matter of life and death.' ' 

As this mood of Mr. Carlyle comes out so 
strongly in the " Latter-Day Pamphlets," it is per- 
haps best to dwell on them at greater leisure. 



180 THE TWO CARLYLES 

The first is " The Present Time." In this he 
describes Democracy as inevitable, but as utterly- 
evil ; calls for a government ; finds most European 
governments, that of England included, to be shams 
and falsities, — no-government, or drifting, to be a 
yet greater evil. The object, he states, is to find 
the noblest and best men to govern. Democracy 
fails to do this ; for universal balloting is not ade- 
quate to the task. Democracy answered in the old 
republics, when the mass were slaves, but will not 
answer now. The United States are no proof of 
its success, for (1st) anarchy is avoided merely by 
the quantity of cheap land, and (2d) the United 
States have produced no spiritual results, but only 
material. Democracy in America is no-govern- 
ment, and " its only feat is to have produced eigh- 
teen millions of the greatest bores ever seen in the 
world." Mr. Carlyle's plan, therefore, is to find, 
somehow, the best man for a ruler, to make him a 
despot, to make the mass of the English and Irish 
slaves, to beat them if they will not work, to shoot 
them if they still refuse. The only method of find- 
ing this best man, which he suggests, is to call for 
him. Accordingly, Mr. Thomas Carlyle calls, say- 
ing, " Best man, come forward, and govern." 

The sum, therefore, of his recipe for the diseases 
of the times is Slavery. 

The second pamphlet is called " Model Prisons," 
and the main object of this is to ridicule all at- 
tempts at helping men by philanthropy or human- 



THE TWO CARLYLES 181 

ity. The talk of " Fraternity " is nonsense, and 
must be drummed out of the world. Beginning 
with model prisons, he finds them much too good 
for the " scoundrels " who are shut up there. He 
would have them whipped and hung (seventy 
thousand in a year, we suppose, as in bluff King 
Harry's time, with no great benefit therefrom). 
" Revenge," he says, " is a right feeling against bad 
men, — only the excess of it wrong." The proper 
thing to say to a bad man is, " Caitiff, I hate thee." 
"A collar round the neck, and a cart-whip over 
the back," is what he thinks would be more just to 
criminals than a model prison. The whole effort 
of humanity should be to help the industrious and 
virtuous poor ; the criminals should be swept out of 
the way, whipt, enslaved, or hung. As for human 
brotherhood, he does not admit brotherhood with 
" scoundrels." Particularly disgusting to him is it 
to hear this philanthropy to bad men called Chris- 
tianity. Christianity, he thinks, does not tell us to 
love the bad, but to hate them as God hates them. 
According, probably, to his private expurgated 
version of the Gospel, " that ye may be the chil- 
dren of your Father in heaven, whose sun rises 
only on the good, and whose rain falls only on the 
just." 

" Downing Street " and " New Downing Street " 
are fiery tirades against the governing classes in 
England. Mr. Carlyle says (according to his in- 
evitable refrain), that England does not want a 



182 THE TWO CARLYLES 

reformed Parliament, a body of talkers, but a 
reformed Downing Street, a body of workers. He 
describes the utter imbecility of the English gov- 
ernment, and calls loudly for some able man to 
take its place. Two passages are worth quoting ; 
the first as to England's aspect in her foreign rela- 
tions, which is quite as true for 1864 as for 1854. 

" How it stands with the Foreign Office, again, 
one still less knows. Seizures of Sapienza, and the 
like sudden appearances of Britain in the charac- 
ter of Hercules-Harlequin, waving, with big bully- 
voice, her sword of sharpness over field-mice, and 
in the air making horrid circles (horrid Catherine- 
wheels and death-disks of metallic terror from said 
huge sword) to see how they will like it. Her- 
cules-Harlequin, the Attorney Triumphant, the 
World's Busybody ! " 

Or see the following description of the sort of 
rulers who prevail in England, no less than in 
America : — 

" If our government is to be a No-Government, 
what is the matter who administers it? Fling an 
orange-skin into St. James Street, let the man it 
hits be your man. He, if you bend him a little to 
it, and tie the due official bladders to his ankles, 
will do as well as another this sublime problem of 
balancing himself upon the vortexes, with the long 
loaded pole in his hand, and will, with straddling, 
painful gestures, float hither and thither, walking 
the waters in that singular manner for a little 



THE TWO CABLYLES 183 

while><till he also capsize, and be left floating feet 
uppermost, — after which you choose another." 

Concerning which we may say, that if this is the 
result of monarchy and aristocracy in England, 
we can stick a little longer to our democracy in 
America. Mr. Carlyle says that the object of all 
these methods is to find the ablest man for a ruler. 
He thinks our republican method very insufficient 
and absurd, — much preferring the English sys- 
tem, — and then tells us that this is the outcome 
of the latter ; that you might as well select your 
ruler by throwing an orange-skin into the street as 
by the method followed in England. 

Despotism, tempered by assassination, seems to 
be Carlyle's notion of a good government. 

The pamphlet " Stump-Orator" is simply a bit- 
ter denunciation of all talking, speech-making, 
and writing, as the curse of the time, and ends with 
the proposition to cut out the tongues of one whole 
generation, as an act of mercy to them and a bless- 
ing to the human race. 

Thus this collection of " Latter-Day Pamphlets " 
consists of the bitterest cynicism. Carlyle sits in 
it, as in a tub, snarling at freedom, yelping at phi- 
lanthropy, growling at the English government, 
snapping at all men who speak or write, and end- 
ing with one long howl over the universal falsity 
and hollowness of mankind in general. 

After which he proceeds to his final apotheosis 
of despotism pure and simple, in this "Life of 



184 THE TWO CABLYLES 

Frederick the Great." Of this it is not necessary 
to say more than that Frederick, being an absolute 
despot, but a very able one, having plunged Eu- 
rope into war in order to steal Silesia, is every- 
where admired, justified, or excused by Carlyle, 
who reserves his rebukes and contempt for those 
who find fault with all this. 

That, with these opinions, Carlyle should have 
taken sides with the slaveholders' conspiracy 
against the Union is not surprising. His sym- 
pathies were with them ; first, as slaveholders, 
secondly, as aristocrats. He hates us because we 
are democrats, and he loves them because they are 
despots and tyrants. Long before the outbreak of 
the rebellion, he had ridiculed emancipation, and 
denounced as folly and evil the noblest deed of 
England, — the emancipation of her West India 
slaves. In scornful, bitter satire, he denounced 
England for keeping the fast which God had cho- 
sen,' in undoing the heavy burdens, letting the 
oppressed go free, and breaking every yoke. He 
ridiculed the black man, and described the poor 
patient African as " Quashee, steeped to the eyes 
in pumpkin." In the hateful service of oppression 
he had already done his best to uphold slavery and 
discourage freedom. And while he fully belie vod 
in enslaving the laboring population, black or white, 
and driving it to work by the cart- whip, he as fully 
abhorred republicanism everywhere, and most of 
all in the United States. He had exhausted the 



THE TWO CABLYLES 185 

resources of language in vilifying American insti- 
tutions. It was a matter of course, therefore, that 
at the outbreak of this civil war all his sympathies 
should be with those who whip women and sell 
babies. 

How is it that this great change should have 
taken place ? Men change, — but not often in 
this way. The ardent reformer often hardens into 
the stiff conservative. The radical in religion is 
very likely to join the Catholic Church. If a 
Catholic changes his religion, he goes over to 
atheism. To swing from one extreme to another, 
is a common experience. But it is a new thing to 
see calmness in youth, violence in age, — to find 
the young man wise and all-sided, the old man 
bigoted and narrow. 

We think the explanation to be this. 

Thomas Carlyle from the beginning has not 
shown the least appreciation of the essential thing 
in Christianity. Brought up in Scotland, inherit- 
ing from Calvinism a sense of truth, a love of 
justice, and a reverence for the Jewish Bible, he 
has never passed out of Judaism into Christianity. 
To him, Oliver Cromwell is the best type of true 
religion ; inflexible justice the best attribute of 
God or man. He is a worshiper of Jehovah, not 
of the God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ. 
He sees in God truth and justice ; he does not see 
in him love. He is himself a prophet after the 
type of Elijah and John the Baptist. He is the 



186 THE TWO CABLYLES 

voice crying in the wilderness ; and we may say of 
him, therefore, as was said of his prototype, " He 
was a burning and a shining light, and ye were 
willing, for a season, to rejoice in his light," — 
but not always, — not now. 

Carlyle does not, indeed, claim to be a Jew, or 
to reject Christ. On the contrary, he speaks of 
him with very sincere respect. He seems, how- 
ever, to know nothing of him but what he has read 
in Goethe about the "worship of sorrow." The 
Gospel appears to him to be, essentially, a worship 
of sorrow. That Christ " came to save sinners," 
— of that Carlyle has not the faintest idea. To 
him the notion of " saving sinners " is only " rose- 
water philanthropy." He does not wish them 
saved, he wishes them damned, — swept into hell 
as soon as convenient. 

But, as everything which is real has two sides, 
that of truth and that of love, — it usually happens 
that he who only sees one side at last ceases even 
to see that. All goodness, to Carlyle, is truth, — 
in man it is sincerity, or love of reality, sight of 
the actual facts, — in God it is justice, divine 
adherence to law, infinite guidance of the world 
and of every human soul according to a strict and 
inevitable rule of righteousness. At first this 
seems to be a providence, — and Carlyle has 
everywhere, in the earlier epoch, shown full con- 
fidence in Providence. But believe only in jus- 
tice and truth, — omit the doctrine of forgiveness, 



THE TWO CABLYLES 187 

redemption, salvation, — and faith in Providence 
becomes sooner or later a despairing fatalism. 
The dark problem of evil remains insoluble with- 
out the doctrine of redemption. 

So it was that Carlyle, seeing at first the chief 
duty of man to be the worship of reality, the love 
of truth, next made that virtue to consist in 
sincerity, or being in earnest. Truth was being 
true to one's self. In this lay the essence of hero- 
ism. So that Burns, being sincere and earnest, 
was a hero, — Odin was a hero, — Mohammed 
was a hero, — Cromwell was a hero, — Mirabeau 
and Danton were heroes, — and Frederick the 
Great was a hero. That which was first the love 
of truth, and caused him to reverence the calm 
intellectual force of Schiller and Goethe, soon 
became earnestness and sincerity, and then became 
power. For the proof of earnestness is power. 
So from power, by eliminating all love, all tender- 
ness, as being only rose-water philanthropy, he at 
last became a worshiper of mere will, of force in 
its grossest form. So he illustrates those lines of 
Shakespeare in which this process is so well de- 
scribed. In " Troilus and Cressida " Ulysses is 
insisting on the importance of keeping everything 
in its place, and giving to the best things and 
persons their due priority. Otherwise, mere force 
will govern all things. 

"Strength would be lord of imbecility, " — 



188 THE TWO CARLYLES 

as Carlyle indeed openly declares that it ought to 
be, — 

" And the rude son should strike his father dead," 

which Carlyle does not quite approve of in the 
case of Dr. Francia. But why not, if he main- 
tains that strength is the measure of justice ? 

" Force should be right ; or, rather, right and wrong 
(Between whose endless jar justice resides) 
Should lose their names and so should justice, too. 
Then everything includes itself in power, 
Power into will, will into appetite ; 
And appetite, an universal wolf, 
So doubly seconded with will and power, 
Must make perforce an universal prey, 
And, last, eat up himself 11 

Just so, in the progress of Carlyle's literary 
career, first, force became right, — then, every- 
thing included itself in power, — next, power was 
lost in will, and will in mere caprice or appetite. 
From his admiration for Goethe, as the type of 
intellectual power, he passed to the praise of 
Cromwell as the exponent of will, and then to that 
of Frederick, whose appetite for plunder and terri- 
tory was seconded by an iron will and the highest 
power of intellect ; but whose ambition devoured 
himself, his country, and its prosperity, in the mad 
pursuit of victory and conquest. 

The explanation, therefore, of our author's lapse, 
is simply this, that he worshiped truth divorced 
from love, and so ceased to worship truth, and fell 
into the idolatry of mere will. Truth without 



THE TWO CARLYLES 189 

love is\not truth, but hard, willful opinion, just as 
love without truth is not love, but weak good- 
nature and soft concession. 

Carlyle has no idea of that sublime feature of 
Christianity, which shows to us God caring more 
for the one sinner who repents than the ninety 
and nine just persons which need no repentance. 
To him one just person deserves more care than 
ninety-nine sinners. Yet it is strange that he did 
not learn from his master, Goethe, this essential 
trait of the Gospel. For Goethe, in a work trans- 
lated by Carlyle himself, distinguishes between 
the three religions thus. The ethnic or Gentile 
religions, he says, reverence what is above us, — 
the religion of the philosopher reverences what is 
on our own level, — but Christianity reverences 
what is beneath us. " This is the last step," says 
Goethe, " which mankind were destined to attain, 

— to recognize humility and poverty, mockery 
and despite, disgrace and wretchedness, as divine, 

— nay, even on sin and crime to look not as hin- 
drances, but to honor and love them as fur- 
therances of what is holy" 

On sin and crime, as we have seen, Carlyle 
looks with no such tenderness. But if he does not 
care for the words of Christ, teaching us that we 
must forgive if we hope to be forgiven, if he does 
not care for the words of his master, Goethe, he 
might at least remember his own exposition of this 
doctrine in an early work, where he shows that the 



190 THE TWO CABLYLES 

poor left to perish by disease infect a whole com- 
munity, and declares that the safety of all is in- 
volved in the safety of the humblest. 

In 1840, when he wrote " Chartism," Carlyle 
seems to have known better than he did in 1855, 
when he wrote these "Latter-Day Pamphlets." 
Then he said : — 

" To believe practically that the poor and luck- 
less are here only as a nuisance to be abraded and 
abated, and in some permissible manner made 
away, and swept out of sight, is not an amiable 
faith." 

Of Ireland, too, he said : — 

" We English pay, even now, the bitter smart 
of long centuries of injustice to Ireland." " It is 
the feeling of injustice that is insupportable to 
all men. The brutalest black African feels it, 
and cannot bear that, he should be used unjustly. 
No man can bear it, or ought to bear it." 

This seems like the " rose-water philanthropy " 
which he subsequently so much disliked. In this 
book also he speaks of a " seven years' Silesian 
robber-war," — we trust not intending to call his 
beloved Frederick a robber ! And again he pro- 
poses, as one of the best things to be done 
in England, to have all the people taught by 
government to read and write, — the same thing 
which this American democracy, in which he could 
see not one good thing, has so long been doing. 
That was the plan by which England was to be 



THE TWO CARLYLES 191 

saved. — a plan first suggested in England in 
1840, — adopted and acted on in America for two 
hundred years. 

But just as love separated from truth becomes 
cruelty, so truth by itself — truth not tempered 
and fulfilled by love — runs sooner or later into 
falsehood. Truth, after a while, becomes dogma- 
tism, overbearing assertion, willful refusal to see 
and hear other than one's own belief ; that is to 
say, it becomes falsehood. Such has been the case 
with our author. On all the subjects to which 
he has committed himself he closes his eyes, and 
refuses to see the other side. Like his own sym- 
bol, the mighty Bull, he makes his charge with his 
eyes shut. 

Determined, for example, to rehabilitate such 
men as Mirabeau, Cromwell, Frederick, and Fred- 
erick's father, he does thorough work, and defends 
or excuses all their enormities, palliating whenever 
he cannot justify. 

What can we call this which he says 1 concerning 
the execution of Lieutenant Katte, by order of old 
King Friedrich Wilhelm? Tired of the tyranny 
of his father, tired of being kicked and caned, the 
young prince tried to escape. He was caught and 
held as a deserter from the army, and his father 
tried to run him through the body. Lieutenant 
Katte, who had aided him in getting away, having 
been kicked and caned, was sent to a court-martial 

1 Frederick the Great, vol. ii. p. 223. 



192 THE TWO CABLYLES 

to be tried. The court-martial found him guilty 
not of deserting, but of intending to desert, and 
sentenced him to two years' imprisonment. Where- 
upon the king went into a rage, declared that Katte 
had committed high treason, and ordered him to be 
executed. Whereupon Carlyle thus writes : — 

" ' Never was such a transaction before or since 
in modern history,' cries the angry reader ; ' cruel, 
like the grinding of human hearts under millstones ; 
like — ' Or, indeed, like the doings of the gods, 
which are cruel, but not that alone." 

In other words, Carlyle cannot make up his mind 
frankly to condemn this atrocious murder, and call 
it by its right name. He must needs try to sophis- 
ticate us by talking about " the doings of the 
gods." Because Divine Providence takes men out 
of the world in various ways, it is therefore allow- 
able to a king, provided he be a hero grim enough 
and "earnest" enough, to kick men, cane them, 
and run them through the body when he pleases ; 
and, after having sent a man to be tried by court- 
martial, if the court acquits him, to order him to 
be executed by his own despotic will. A truth- 
telling Carlyle ought to have said, " I admit this 
is murder ; but I like the old fellow, and so I will 
call it right." A Carlyle grown sophistical mum- 
bles something about its being like " the doings of 
the gods," and leaves off with that small attempt 
at humbug. Be brave, my men, and defend my 
Lord Jeffreys next for bullying juries into hanging 



THE TWO CABLYLES 193 

prisoners. Was not Jeffreys " grim " too ? In 
fact, are not most murderers "grim " ? 

We have had occasion formerly, in this journal, 
to examine the writings of another very positive 
and clear-headed thinker, — Mr. Henry James. 
Mr. James is, in his philosophy, the very antithesis 
of Carlyle. With equal fervor of thought, with a 
like vehemence of style, with a somewhat similar 
contempt for his opponents, Mr. James takes ex- 
actly the opposite view of religion and duty. As 
Carlyle preaches the law, and the law alone, main- 
taining justice as the sole Divine attribute, so Mr. 
James preaches the Gospel only, denying totally 
that to the Divine Mind any distinction exists be- 
tween saint and sinner, unless that the sinner is 
somewhat more of a favorite than the saint. We 
did not, do not, agree with Mr. James in his anti- 
nomianism ; as between him and Carlyle, we think 
his doctrine far the truer and nobler. He stands 
on a higher plane, and sees much the farther. A 
course of reading in Mr. James's books might, we 
think, help our English cynic not a little. 

God is the perfect harmony of justice and love. 
His justice is warmed through and through with 
love, his love is sanctified and made strong by jus- 
tice. And so, in Christ, perfect justice was ful- 
filled in perfect love. But in him first was fully 
revealed, in this world, the Divine fatherly tender- 
ness to the lost, to the sinner, to those lowest down 
and farthest away. In him was taught that our 



194 THE TWO CARLYLES 

own redemption from evil does not lie in despising 
and hating men worse than ourselves, but in sav- 
ing them. The hard Pharisaic justice of Carlyle 
may call this " rose-water philanthropy," but till 
he accepts it from his heart, and repents of his con- 
tempt for his fallen fellowmen, till he learns to 
love " scoundrels," there is no hope for him. He 
lived once in the heaven of reverence, faith, and 
love ; he has gone from it into the hell of Pharisaic 
scorn and contempt. Till he comes back out of 
that, there is no hope for him. 

But such a noble nature cannot be thus lost. 
He will one day, let us trust, worship the divine 
love which he now abhors. Cromwell asked, on 
his death-bed, " if those once in a state of grace 
could fall," and, being assured not, said, " I am 
safe then, for I am sure I was once in a state of 
grace." There is a truth in this doctrine of the 
perseverance of saints. Some truths once fully 
seen, even though afterward rejected by the mind 
and will, stick like a barbed arrow in the con- 
science, tormenting the soul till they are again 
accepted and obeyed. Such a truth Carlyle once 
saw, in the great doctrine of reverence for the 
fallen and the sinful. He will see it again, if not 
in this world, then in some other world. 

The first Carlyle was an enthusiast, the last 
Carlyle is a cynic. From enthusiasm to cynicism, 
from the spirit of reverence to the spirit of con- 
tempt, the way seems long, but the condition of 



THE TWO CARLYLES 195 

arriVing is simple. Discard Love, and the whole 
road is passed over. Divorce love from truth, and 
truth ceases to be open and receptive, — ceases to 
be a positive function, turns into acrid criticism, 
bitter disdain, cruel and hollow laughter, empty of 
all inward peace. Such is the road which Carlyle 
has passed over, from his earnest, hopeful youth to 
his bitter old age. 

Carlyle fulfilled for many, during these years, 
the noble work of a mediator. By reverence and 
love he saw what was divine in nature, in man, 
and in life. By the profound sincerity of his 
heart, his worship of reality, his hatred of false- 
hood, he escaped from the commonplaces of litera- 
ture to a better land of insight and knowledge. 
So he was enabled to lead many others out of their 
entanglements, into his own luminous insight. It 
was a great and blessed work. Would that it had 
been sufficient for him ! 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 1 

We welcomed kindly the first installment of Mr. 
Buckle's work, 2 giving a cursory account of it, and 
hinting, rather than urging, the objections which 
readily suggested themselves against theories con- 
cerning Man, History, Civilization, and Human 
Progress. But now it seems a proper time to dis- 
cuss with a little more deliberation the themes 
opened before us by this intrepid writer, — this 
latest champion of that theory of the mind which 
in the last century was called Materialism and 
Necessity, and which in the present has been re- 
baptized as Positivism. 

The doctrines of which Mr. Buckle is the ardent 
advocate seem to us, the more thoroughly we con- 
sider them, to be essentially theoretical, superficial, 
and narrow. They are destitute of any broad 
basis of reality. In their application by Mr. 
Buckle, they fail to solve the historic problems 
upon which he tries their power. With a show of 
science, they are unscientific, being a mere collec- 

1 The Christian Examiner, November, 1861. 

2 History of Civilization in England. By Henry Thomas 
Buckle. Vols. I. and II. New York: D. Appleton and Com- 
pany. 



UCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 197 



tion of unverified hypotheses. And if Mr. Buckle 
should succeed in introducing his principles and 
methods into the study of history, it would be 
equivalent to putting backward for about a century 
this whole department of thought. 

Yet, while we state this as our opinion, and one 
which we shall presently endeavor to substantiate 
by ample proof, we do not deny to Mr. Buckle's 
volumes the interest arising from vigorous and 
independent thinking, faithful study of details, 
and a strong, believing purpose. They are inter- 
esting and valuable contributions to our literature. 
But this is not on account of their purpose, but 
in spite of it ; notwithstanding their doctrines, not 
because of them. The interest of these books, as 
of all good history, derives itself from their pic- 
turesque reproduction of life. Whatever of value 
belongs to Mr. Buckle's work is the same as that 
of the writings of Macaulay, Motley, and Carlyle. 
Whoever has the power of plunging like a diver 
into the spirit of another period, sympathizing with 
its tone, imbuing himself with its instincts, sharing 
its loves and hates, its faith and its skepticism, will 
write its history so as to interest us. For whoever 
will really show to us the breathing essence of any 
age, any state of society, or any course of human 
events, cannot fail of exciting that element of the 
soul which causes man everywhere to rejoice in 
meeting with man. He who will write the history 
of Arabians, Kelts, or Chinese, of the Middle 



198 BUCKLE AND HIS THEOEY OF AVERAGES 

Ages, the Norman Sea-kings, or the Soman Plebs, 
so that we can see ourselves beneath these diverse 
surroundings of race, country, and period, and see 
that these also are really men, — this writer in- 
stantly awakens our interest, whether he call him- 
self poet, novelist, or historian. In all cases, the 
secret of success is to write so as to enable the 
reader to identify himself with the characters of 
another age. Great authors enable us to look 
at actions, not from without, but from within. 
When we read the historic plays of Shakespeare, 
or the historic novels of Scott, we are charmed by 
finding that kings and queens are, after all, our 
poor human fellow-creatures, sharing all our old, 
familiar struggles, pains, and joys. When we read 
that great historic masterpiece, the " French Revo- 
lution " of Carlyle, the magic touch of the artist 
introduces us into the heart of every character in 
the motley, shifting scene. We are the poor king 
escaping to Varennes under the dewy night and 
solemn stars. We are tumultuous Mirabeau, with 
his demonic but generous soul. We are devoted 
Charlotte Cor day ; we are the Gironde ; we the 
poor prisoners of Terror, waiting in our prison for 
the slow morning to bring the inevitable doom. 
This is the one indispensable faculty for the his- 
torian ; and this faculty Mr. Buckle so far pos- 
sesses as to make his page a living one. It is true 
that his sympathy is intellectual rather than imagi- 
native. It is not of the high order of Shakespeare, 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 199 



nor^even of that of Carlyle. But, so far as it goes, 
it is a true faculty, and makes a true historian. 

Yet we cannot but notice how the effectual 
working of this historic organ is interfered with 
by the dogmatic purpose of Mr. Buckle ; and, on 
the other hand, how his theoretic aim is disturbed 
by the interest of his narrative. His history is 
always meant to be an argument. His narrations 
of events are never for their own sake, but always 
to prove some thesis. There is, therefore, no con- 
secutive narrative, no progress of events, no sus- 
tained interest. These volumes are episodes, put 
together we cannot well say how, or why. In the 
seventh chapter of the first volume we have a 
graphic description of the Court life in England in 
the days of Charles II., James II., William, and 
the Georges, in connection with the condition of 
the Church and clergy. From this we are taken, 
in the next chapter, to France, and to similar rela- 
tions between Henry IV., Louis XIII., Richelieu, 
and the French Catholics and Protestants. We 
then are brought back to England, to consider the 
protective system there ; and once more we return 
to France, to investigate its operation in that 
country. Afterward we have an essay on "The 
State of Historical Literature in France from the 
End of the Sixteenth to the End of the Eighteenth 
Century," followed by another essay on the "Prox- 
imate Causes of the French Revolution." Many 
very well finished biographic portraits are given 



200 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

us in these chapters. There are excellent sketches 
of Burke, Voltaire, Richelieu, Bossuet, Montes- 
quieu, Rousseau, Bichat, in the first volume; and 
of Adam Smith, Reid, Black, Leslie, Hutton, 
Cullen, Hunter, ' in the second. These jiumerous 
biographic sketches, which are often accompanied 
with good literary notices of the writings of these 
authors, are very ably written ; but it is curious to 
remember, while reading them, that Mr. Buckle 
thinks that, as history advances, it has less and 
less to do with biography. 

There is an incurable defect in the method of 
this work. On the one hand, the dogmatic pur- 
pose is constantly breaking into the interest of the 
narration ; on the other, the interest of the narra- 
tion is continually enticing the writer from his 
argument into endless episodes and details of bio- 
graphy. The argument is deprived of its force by 
the story ; the story is interrupted continually on 
account of the argument. Mr. Buckle has mis- 
taken the philosophy of history for history itself. 
A history of civilization is not a piece of meta- 
physical argument, but a consecutive account of the 
social progress either of an age or of a nation. 
This irreconcilable conflict of purpose, while it 
leaves to the parts of the work their value, des- 
troys its worth as a whole. 

Mr. Buckle might probably inquire whether we 
would eliminate wholly from history all philoso- 
phic aim, all teleologic purpose. He objects, and 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 201 

very properly, to degrading history into mere an- 
nals, without any instructive purpose. We agree 
with him. We do not admire the style of history 
which feels neither passion nor sympathy, which 
narrates crimes without indignation, and which 
has no aim in its narration except to entertain a 
passing hour. But it is one thing deliberately to 
announce a thesis and bring detached passages of 
history to prove it, and another to write a history 
which, by its incidents, spirit, and characters shall 
convey impulse and instruction. The historian 
may dwell upon the events which illustrate his 
convictions, and may develop the argument during 
the progress of his moving panorama ; but the his- 
tory itself, as it moves, should impress the lesson. 
The history of Mr. Motley, for example, illus- 
trates and impresses the evils of bigotry, supersti- 
tion, and persecution on the life of nations, quite 
as powerfully as does that of Mr. Buckle ; but 
Mr. Motley never suspends his narrative in order 
to prove to us logically that persecution is an evil. 
Mr. Buckle, in his style of writing, belongs to a 
modern class of authors whom we may call the 
bullying school. It is true that he is far less ex- 
travagant than some of them, and indeed is not 
deeply tinged with their peculiar manner. The 
first great master of this class of writers is Thomas 
Carlyle ; but their peculiarity has been carried to 
its greatest extent by Euskin. Its characteristic 
feature is treating with supreme contempt, as 



202 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

though they were hopeless imbeciles, all who ven- 
ture to question the dicta of the writer. This 
superb arrogance makes these writers rather popu- 
lar with the English, who, as a nation, like equally 
well to bully and to be bullied. 

Buckle professes to have at last found the only 
true key to history, and to have discovered some of 
its important laws, especially those which regard 
the progress of civilization. 

I. His View of Freedom. — Mr. Buckle's fun- 
damental position is, that the actions of men are 
governed by fixed laws, and that, when these laws 
are discovered, history will become a science, like 
geometry, geology, or astronomy. The chief ob- 
stacle hitherto to its becoming a science has been 
the belief that the actions of men were determined, 
not by fixed laws, but by free will (which he con- 
siders equivalent to chance), or by supernatural 
interference or providence (which he regards as 
equivalent to fate). " We shall thus be led," he 
says (Vol. I. p. 6, Am. ed.), " to one vast question, 
which, indeed, lies at the root of the whole subject, 
and is simply this : Are the actions of men, and 
therefore of societies, governed by fixed laws, or 
are they the result either of chance or of super- 
natural interference ? " Identifying freedom with 
chance, Mr. Buckle denies that there is such a 
thing, and maintains that every human action is 
determined by some antecedent, inward or out- 
ward, and that not one is determined by the free 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 203 

choice of the man himself. His principal argu- 
ment against free will is the law of averages, which 
we will therefore proceed to consider in its bearing 
on this point. 

Statistics, carefully collected during many years 
and within different countries, show a regularity 
of return in certain vices and crimes, which indi- 
cates the presence of law. Thus, about the same 
number of murders are committed every year in cer- 
tain countries and large cities, and even the instru- 
ments by which they are committed are employed 
in the same proportion. Suicide also follows some 
regular law. " In a given state of society, a cer- 
tain number of persons must put an end to their 
own life." In London, about two hundred and 
forty persons kill themselves every year, — in 
years of panic and disaster a few more, in prosper* 
ous years not quite so many. Other actions of 
men are determined in the same way, — not by 
personal volition, but by some controlling circum- 
stance. " It is now known that the number of 
marriages in England bears a fixed and definite 
relation to the price of corn." "Aberrations of 
memory are marked by this general character of 
necessary and invariable order." The same aver- 
age number of persons forget every year to direct 
the letters dropped into the post-offices of London 
and Paris. Facts of this kind " force us to the 
conclusion," says Buckle, " that the offenses of 
men are the result, not so much of the vices of the 



204 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

individual offender, as of the state of society into 
which he is thrown." 

The argument then is : If man's moral actions 
are under law, they are not free, for freedom is 
the absence of law. The argument of Mr. Buckle 
is conclusive, provided freedom does necessarily 
imply the absence of law. But such, we think, is 
not the fact. 

The actions of man do not proceed solely from 
the impact of external circumstances ; for then he 
would be no better than a ball struck with a bat. 
Nor do they proceed solely from the impulses of 
his animal nature ; for then he would be only a 
superior kind of machine, moved by springs and 
wheels. But in addition to external and internal 
impulse there is also in man the power of personal 
effort, activity, will, — to which we give the name 
of Free Choice, or Freedom. This modifies and 
determines a part of his actions, — while a second 
part come from the influence of circumstance, and 
a third from organic instincts and habitual tenden- 
cies. 

Now, it is quite certain that no man has freedom 
of will enough to cause his whole nexus of activity 
to proceed from it. For if a man could cause all 
his actions to proceed by a mere choice or effort, 
he could turn himself at will into another man. 
In other words, there could be no such thing as 
permanent moral character. No one could be de- 
scribed ; for while we were describing him, he might 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 205 

choose to be different, and so would become some- 
body else. It is evident, therefore, that some part 
of every man's life must lie outside of the domain 
of freedom. 

In what, then, does the essence of freedom con- 
sist ? If it be not the freedom to do whatever we 
choose, what is it ? Plainly, if we analyze our own 
experience, we shall find that it is simply what its 
scholastic name implies, freedom of choice, or liber 
arbitrio. It is not, in the last analysis, freedom 
to act, but it is freedom to choose. 

But freedom to choose what ? Can we choose 
anything ? Certainly not. Our freedom of choice 
is limited by our knowledge. We cannot choose 
that which we do not know. We must choose some- 
thing within the range of our experience. And our 
freedom of choice consists in the alternative of mak- 
ing this choice or omitting to make it, — exerting 
ourselves or not exerting ourselves. Consciousness 
testifies universally to this extent of freedom. We 
know by our consciousness that we can exert our- 
selves or not exert ourselves at any moment, — 
exert ourselves to act or not exert ourselves to act, 
to speak or not to speak. This power of making 
or not making an effort is freedom in its simplest 
and lowest form. 

In this lowest form, it is apparent that human 
freedom is inadequate to give any permanent char- 
acter to human actions. They will be directed by 
the laws of organization and circumstance. Free- 



206 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

dom in this sense may be compared to the power 
which a man has of rowing a boat in the midst of 
a fog. He may exert himself to row, he may row 
at any moment forward or backward, to the right 
or to the left. He has this freedom, — but it does 
not enable him to go in any special direction. Not 
being able to direct his boat to any fixed aim, it is 
certain that it will be drifted by the currents or 
blown by the winds. Freedom in this form is only 
willfulness, because devoid of an inward law. 

But let the will direct itself by a fixed law, and 
it at once becomes true freedom, and begins to im- 
press itself upon actions, modifying the results of 
organization and circumstance. Not even in this 
case can it destroy those results ; it only modifies 
them. It enters as a third factor with those other 
two to produce the product. The total character 
of a man's actions will be represented by a formula, 
thus : John's Organization X John's Circumstances 
X John's Freedom = John's Character. 

Apply this to the state of society where the law 
of averages has been discovered. In such a society 
there are always to be found three classes of per- 
sons. In the first class, freedom is either dormant 
or is mere willfulness. The law of mind is subject 
therefore in these to the law of the members. 
The will is an enslaved will, and its influence on 
action is a nullity, not needing to be taken into 
the account. From this class come the largest pro- 
portion of the crimes and vices, regular in number 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 207 

because resulting from constant conditions of so- 
ciety. Of these persons we can predict with cer- 
tainty that, under certain strong temptations to 
evil, they will inevitably yield. 

But in another class of persons the will has 
learned to direct itself by a moral law toward a 
fixed aim. The man in the boat is now steering 
by a compass, and ceases to be the sport of current 
and gale. The will reacts upon organization, and 
directs circumstance. The man has learned how 
to master his own nature, and how to arrange ex- 
ternal conditions. We can predict with certainty 
that under no possible influences will this class 
yield to some forms of evil. 

There is also in each community a third class, 
who are struggling, but not emancipated. They 
are partly free, but not wholly so. From this class 
come the slight variations of the average, now a 
little better, now a little worse. 

Applying this view of the freedom of the will to 
history, we see that the problem is far more com- 
plicated than Mr. Buckle admits. Man's freedom, 
with him, is an element not to be taken into con- 
sideration, because it does not exist. But the truth 
is, that human freedom is not only a factor, but a 
variable factor, the value of which changes with 
every variety of human condition. In the savage 
condition it obeys organization and circumstances, 
and has little effect on social condition. But as 
civilization advances, the power of freedom to react 



208 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

on organization and circumstance increases, vary- 
ing however again, according to the force and in- 
spiration of the ideas by which it is guided. And 
of all these ideas, precisely those which Mr. Buckle 
underrates, namely, moral and religious ideas, are 
those which most completely emancipate the will 
from circumstances, and vitalize it with an all-con- 
quering force. 

To see this, take two extreme cases, — that of an 
African Hottentot, and that of Joan of Arc. Free 
will in the African is powerless ; he remains the 
helpless child of his situation. But the Maid of 
Arc, though utterly destitute of Mr. Buckle's " In- 
tellectual Truths " (being unable to read or write, 
and having received no instruction save religious 
ideas), and wanting in the " Skepticism " which he 
thinks so essential to all historic progress, yet de- 
velops a power of will which reacts upon circum- 
stances so as to turn into another channel the cur- 
rent of French history. All bonds of situation 
and circumstance are swept asunder by the power 
of a will set free by mighty religious convictions. 
The element of freedom, therefore, is one not to be 
neglected by an historian, except to his own loss. 

The law of averages applies only to undeveloped 
men, or to the undeveloped sides of human nature, 
where the element of freedom has not come in 
play. When the human race shall have made 
such progress that it shall contain a city inhabited 
by a million persons all equal to the Apostle Paul 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 209 

and the Apostle John in spiritual development, it 
will not be found that a certain regular number 
kill their wives every year, or that from two hun- 
dred and thirteen to two hundred and forty annu- 
ally commit suicide. Nor will this escape from 
the averages be owing to an increased acquaintance 
with physical laws so much as to a higher moral 
development. We shall return to this point, how- 
ever, when we examine more fully Buckle's doc- 
trine in regard to the small influence of religion 
on civilization. 

II. Mr. Buckle's View of Organization. — Mr. 
Buckle sets aside entirely the whole great fact of 
organization, upon which the science of ethnology 
is based. Perhaps the narrowness of his mind 
shows more conspicuously in this than elsewhere. 
He attributes no influence to race in civilization. 
While so many eminent writers at the present day 
say, with Mr. Knox, that " Race is everything," 
Mr. Buckle quietly rejoins that Race is nothing. 
" Original distinctions of race," he says, " are al- 
together hypothetical." " We have no decisive 
ground for saying that the moral and intellectual 
faculties in man are likely to be greater in an in- 
fant born in the most civilized part of Europe, 
than in one born in the wildest region of a barbar- 
ous country." (Vol. I. p. 127, Am. ed.) " We 
often hear of hereditary talents, hereditary vices, 
and hereditary virtues ; but whoever will critically 
examine the evidence will find that we have no 



210 BUCKLE AXD HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

proof of their existence." He doubts the existence 
of hereditary insanity, or a hereditary tendency to 
suicide, or even to disease. (Vol. I. p. 128, note.) 
He does not believe in any progress of natural 
capacity in man, but only of opportunity, " that is, 
an improvement in the circumstances under which 
that capacity after birth comes into play." " Here 
then is the gist of the whole matter. The progress 
is one, not of internal power, but of external ad- 
vantage." He goes on to say, in so many words, 
that the only difference between a barbarian child 
and a civilized child is in the pressure of surround- 
ing circumstances. In support of these opinions 
he quotes Locke and Turgot. 

It is difficult to understand how an intelligent 
and well-informed man, an immense reader and 
active thinker, can have lived in the midst of the 
nineteenth century and retain these views. For 
students at every extreme of thought have equally 
recognized the force* of organization, the constancy 
of race, the permanent varieties existing in the hu- 
man family, the steady riding of the laws of descent. 
If there is any one part of the science of anthropo- 
logy in which the nineteenth century has reversed 
the judgment of the eighteenth, — and that equally 
among men of science, poets, materialists, idealists, 
anatomists, philologists, — it is just here. To find 
so intelligent a man reproducing the last century 
in the midst of the present is a little extraordi- 
nary. 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 211 

Perhaps there could not be found four great 
thinkers more different in their tendencies of 
thought and range of study than Goethe, Spurz- 
heim, Dr. Prichard, and Max Miiller ; yet these 
four, each by his own method of observation, have 
shown with conclusive force the law of variety and 
of permanence in organization. Goethe asserts 
that every individual man carries from his birth to 
his grave an unalterable speciality of being, — 
that he is, down to the smallest fibre of his charac- 
ter, one and the same man ; and that the whole 
mighty power of circumstance, modifying every- 
thing, cannot abolish anything, — that organiza- 
tion and circumstance hold on together with an 
equally permanent influence in every human life. 
Gall and Spurzheim teach that every fibre of the 
brain has its original quality and force, and that 
such qualities and forces are transmitted by ob- 
scure but certain laws of descent. Prichard, with 
immense learning, describes race after race, giving 
the types of each human family in its physiology. 
And, finally, the great science of comparative philo- 
logy, worked out by such thinkers and students as 
Bopp, Latham, Humboldt, Bunsen, Max Miiller, 
and a host of others, has proved the permanence 
of human varieties by ample glossological evidence. 
Thus the modern science of ethnology has arisen, 
on the basis of physiology, philology, and ethology, 
and is perhaps the chief discovery of the age. 
Yet Mr. Buckle quietly ignores the whole of it, 



212 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

and continues, with Locke, to regard every human 
mind as a piece of white paper, to be written on 
by external events, — a piece of soft putty, to be 
moulded by circumstances. 

The facts on which the science of ethnology 
rests are so numerous and so striking, that the 
only difficulty in selecting an illustration is from 
the quantity and richness of material. But we 
may take two instances, — that of the Teutons and 
Kelts, to show the permanence of differences under 
the same circumstances, and that of the Jews, the 
Arabs, and the Gypsies, to show the continuity of 
identity under different circumstances. For if it 
can be made evident that different races of men 
preserve different characters, though living for 
long periods under similar circumstances, and that 
the same race preserves the same character, though 
living for long periods under different circum- 
stances, the proof is conclusive that character is 
not derived from circumstances only. We shall 
not indeed go to the extreme of such ethnologists 
as Knox, Nott, or Gliddon, and say that " Race is 
everything, and circumstances nothing," but we 
shall see that Mr. Buckle is mistaken in saying 
that " Circumstances are everything, and race no- 
thing." 

The differences of character between the Ger- 
man and Keltic varieties of the human race are 
marked, but not extreme. They both belong to 
the same great Indo-European or Aryan family. 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 213 

They both originated in Asia, and the German 
emigration seems to have followed immediately 
after that of the Kelts. Yet when described by 
Caesar, Tacitus, and Strabo, they differed from 
each other exactly as they differ now. They have 
lived for some two thousand years in the same 
climate, under similar political and social institu- 
tions, and yet they have preserved their original 
diversity. 

According to the description of Caesar 1 and 
Tacitus 2 the German tribes differed essentially 
from the Gauls or Kelts in the following particu- 
lars. The Germans loved freedom, and were all 
free. The Kelts did not care for freedom. The 
meanest German was free. But all the inferior 
people among the Kelts were virtually slaves. 
The Germans had no priests, and did not care for 
sacrifices. The Kelts had a powerful priesthood 
and imposing religious rites. The Germans were 
remarkable for their blue eyes, light hair, and 
large limbs. The Kelts were dark-complexioned. 
The Gauls were more quick, but less persevering, 
than the Germans. Ready to attack, they were 
soon discouraged. Tacitus, describing the Ger- 
mans, says : " They are a pure, unmixed, and 
independent race ; there is a family likeness 
through the nation, the same form and features, 
stern blue eyes, ruddy hair ; a strong sense of 
honor ; reverence for women ; religious, but with- 

1 Coram. VI. 11, et seq. 2 Ger mania. 



214 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

out a ritual ; superstitiously believing in super- 
natural signs and portents, but not in a priesthood ; 
not living in cities, but in scattered homes ; re- 
specting marriage ; the children brought up in the 
dirt, among the cattle; hospitable, frank, and 
generous ; fond of drinking beer, and eating pre- 
parations of milk." 

The German and Keltic races, thus distinguished 
in the days of Caesar, are equally distinct to-day. 
Catholicism, the religion of a priesthood, a ritual, 
and authority, prevails among the Kelts ; Protes- 
tantism among the Germans. Ireland, being mainly 
Keltic, is Catholic, though a part of a Protestant 
nation. Prance, being mainly Keltic, is also 
Catholic, in spite of all its illumination, its sci- 
ence, and its knowledge of " intellectual laws." 
But as France contains a large infusion of German 
(Frankish) blood, it is the most Protestant of 
Catholic nations ; while Scotland, containing the 
largest infusion of Keltic blood, is the most priest- 
ridden of Protestant nations. This last fact, which 
Mr. Buckle asserts, and spends half a volume in 
trying to account for, is explained at once by 
ethnology. Wherever the Germans go to-day, 
they remain the same people they were in the days 
of Tacitus ; they carry the same blue eyes and 
light hair, the same love of freedom and hatred 
of slavery, the same tendencies to individualism in 
thought and life, the same tendency to supersti- 
tious belief in supernatural events, even when 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 215 

without belief in any religion or church ; and even 
the same love for beer, and " lac concretum," now 
called " schmeercase " in our Western settlements. 
The Kelt, also, everywhere continues the same. 
He loves equality more than freedom. He is a 
democrat, but not an abolitionist. Very social, 
clannish, with more wit than logic, very sensitive 
to praise, brave, but not determined, needing a 
leader, he carries the spirit of the Catholic Church 
into Protestantism, and the spirit of despotism 
into free institutions. And that physical, no less 
than mental qualities, continue under all climates 
and institutions is illustrated by the blue eyes and 
light hair which the traveller meets among the 
Genoese and Florentines, reminding him of their 
Lombard ancestors ; while their superior tenden- 
cies to freedom in church and state suggest the 
same origin. 

Nineteen hundred years have passed since Julius 
Caesar pointed out these diversities of character 
then existing between the Germans and Kelts. 
Since then they have passed from barbarism to 
civilization. Instead of living in forests, as hunt- 
ers and herdsmen, they have built cities, engaged 
in commerce, manufactures, and agriculture. They 
have been converted to Christianity, have con- 
quered the Roman empire, engaged in crusades,, 
fought in a hundred different wars, developed 
literatures, arts, and sciences, changed and changed 
again their forms of government, have been or- 



216 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

ganized by Feudalism, by Despotism, by Demo- 
cracy, have gone through the Protestant reforma- 
tion, have emigrated to all countries and climates ; 
and yet, at the end of this long period, the Ger- 
man everywhere remains a German, and the Kelt 
a Kelt. The descriptions of Tacitus and Caesar 
still describe them accurately. And yet Mr. 
Buckle undertakes to write a history of civiliza- 
tion without taking the element of race into ac- 
count. 

Perhaps, however, the power of this element of 
race is illustrated still more strikingly in the case 
of the wandering and dispersed families, who, 
having ceased to be a nation, continue in their 
dispersions to manifest the permanent type of their 
original and ineffaceable organization. Wher- 
ever the Jew goes, he remains a Jew. In all 
climates, under all governments, speaking all lan- 
guages, his physical and mental features continue 
the same. This amazing fact bas been held by 
many theologians to be a standing miracle of 
Divine Providence. But Providence works by 
law, and through second causes, and uses in this 
instance the laws of a specially stubborn organiza- 
tion and the force of a tenacious and persistent 
blood to accomplish its ends. The same kind of 
blood in the kindred Semitic family of Arabs pro= 
duces a like result, though to a less striking degree. 
The Bedouins wander for thousands of miles away 
from their peninsula, but always continue Arabs 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 217 

in appearance and character. The light, sinewy 
body and brilliant dark eye, the abstemious habit 
and roaming tendency, mark the Arab in Hin- 
dostan or Barbary. It is a thousand years since 
these nomad tribes left their native home, but 
they continue the same people on the Persian Gulf 
or amid the deserts of Sahara. 

The case of the Gypsies, however, may be still 
more striking, because these seem, in their wan- 
derings over the earth, to have gradually divested 
themselves of every other common attribute ex- 
cept that of race. Unlike the Jews and Arabs, 
they not only adopt the language, but also the 
religion, of the country where they happen to be. 
Yet they always remain unfused and unassimilated. 

The Gypsies first appeared in Europe in 1417, 
in Moldavia, and thence spread into Transylvania 
and Hungary. 1 They afterward passed into all 
the countries of Europe, where their number, at 
the present time, is supposed to reach 700,000 or 
800,000. Everywhere they adopt the common 
form of worship, but are without any real faith. 
Partially civilized in some countries, they always 
retain their own language beside that of the people 
among whom they live. This language, being evi- 
dently derived from the Sanskrit, settles the ques- 
tion of their origin. It is common to all their 

1 George Borrow, The Zincali. See also an excellent article 
by A. G. Paspati, translated from Modern Greek by Rev. C. Ham- 
lin, D. D., in Journal of American Oriental Society, 1861. 



218 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

branches through the world ; as are also the sweet 
voice of their maidens, and their habits of horse- 
dealing, fortune-telling, and petty larceny. With- 
out the bond of religion, history, government, 
literature, or mutual knowledge and intercourse, 
they still remain one and the same people in all 
their dispersions. What gives this unity and per- 
manence, if not race ? Yet race, to Mr. Buckle, 
means nothing. 

III. Mr. Buckle's Theory concerning Skepti- 
cism. — One of the laws of history which Mr. 
Buckle considers himself to have established, if 
not discovered, is that a spirit of skepticism pre- 
cedes necessarily the progress of knowledge, and 
therefore of civilization. By skepticism he means 
a doubt of the truth of received opinions. He 
asserts that " a spirit of doubt " is the necessary 
antecedent to "the love of inquiry." (Vol. I. p. 
242, Am. ed.) " Doubt must intervene before 
investigation can begin. Here, then, we have the 
act of doubting as the originator, or at all events 
the necessary antecedent, of all progress." 

If this were so, progress would be impossible. 
For the great groundwork of knowledge for each 
generation must be laid in the minds of children ; 
and children learn, not by doubting, but by be- 
lieving. Children are actuated at the same time 
by an insatiable curiosity and an unquestioning 
faith. They ask the reason of everything, and 
they accept every reason which is given them. If 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 219 

they stopped to question and to doubt, they would 
learn very little. But by not doubting at all, 
while they are made to believe some errors, they 
acquire an immense amount of information. Kind 
Mother Nature understands the process of learn- 
ing and the principle of progress much better than 
Mr. Buckle, and fortunately supplies every new 
generation of children with an ardent desire for 
knowledge, and a disposition to believe everything 
they hear. 

Perhaps, however, Mr. Buckle refers to men 
rather than children. He may not insist on chil- 
dren's stopping to question everything they hear 
before they believe. But in men perhaps this 
spirit is essential to progress. What great skeptics, 
then, have been also great discoverers? Which 
was the greatest discoverer, Leibnitz or Bayle, 
Sir Isaac Newton or Voltaire ? A faith amount- 
ing nearly to credulity is almost essential to dis- 
covery, — a faith which foresees what it cannot 
prove, which follows suggestions and hints, and so 
traces the faintest impressions left by the flying 
footsteps of truth. The attitude of the intellect 
in all discovery is not that of doubt, but of faith. 
The discoverer always appears to critical and skep- 
tical men as a visionary. 

" To skepticism," says Mr. Buckle, " we owe the 
spirit of inquiry, which, during the last two centu- 
ries, has gradually encroached on every possible 
subject, and reformed every department of prac- 



220 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

tical and speculative knowledge." But this is 
plainly what logicians call a vo-rcpov 7rpor€poi/, or 
what common people call " putting the cart before 
the horse." It is not skepticism which produces 
the spirit of inquiry, but the spirit of inquiry 
which produces skepticism. It was not a doubt 
concerning the Mosaic cosmogony which led to the 
study of geology ; the study of geology led to the 
doubt of the cosmogony. Skepticism concerning 
the authority of the Church did not lead to the 
discovery of the Copernican system ; the discovery 
of the Copernican system led to doubts concern- 
ing the authority of the Church which denied it. 
People do not begin by doubting, but by seeking. 
The love of knowledge leads them to inquire, and 
inquiry shows to them new truths. The new 
truths, being found to be opposed to received opin- 
ions, cause a doubt concerning those opinions to 
arise in the mind. Skepticism, therefore, may 
easily follow, but does not precede inquiry. 

Skepticism, being a negative principle, is neces- 
sarily unproductive and barren. To have no 
strong belief, no fixed opinion, no vital conviction 
for or against anything, — this is surely not a state 
of intellect favorable to any great creation or dis- 
covery. Goethe, who was certainly no bigot, says, in 
a volume of his posthumous works, that skepticism 
is only an inverted superstition, and that this skep- 
ticism is one of the chief evils of the present age. 
"It is worse," he adds, "than superstition, for 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 221 

superstition is the inheritance of energetic, heroic, 
progressive natures ; skepticism belongs to weak, 
contracted, shrinking men, who venture not out of 
themselves." Lord Bacon says (" Advancement of 
Learning," Book II.) that doubts have their advan- 
tages in learning, of which he mentions two, but 
says that "both these commodities do scarcely 
countervail an inconvenience which will intrude 
itself, if it be not debarred ; which is, that when a 
doubt is once received, men labor rather how to 
keep it a doubt than how to solve it." It will be 
seen, therefore, that Lord Bacon gives to skepti- 
cism scarcely more encouragement than is given it 
by Goethe. 

Mr. Buckle says (Vol. I. p. 250) that " Skepti- 
cism, which in physics must always be the begin- 
ning of science, in religion must always be the 
beginning of toleration." We have seen that in 
physics skepticism is rather the end of science than 
its beginning, and the same is true of toleration. 
Skepticism does not necessarily produce toleration. 
The Roman augurs, who laughed in each other's 
faces, were quite ready to assist at the spectacle of 
Christians thrown to the lions. Skeptics, not hav- 
ing any inward conviction as a support, rest on 
established opinions, and are angry at seeing them 
disturbed. A strong belief is sufficient for itself, 
but a half-belief wishes to put down all doubts by 
force. This is well expressed by Thomas Burnet 
(Epistola 2, De Arch. Phil.) : " Non potui non in 



222 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

illam semper propendere opinionein, Neminem 
irasci in veritate defendenda, qui eandem plene 
possidet, viditque in elaro lumine. Evidens enim, 
et indubitata ratio, sibi sufficit et acquiescit : aliis- 
que a scopo oberrantibus, non tarn succenset, quam 
miseretur. Sed cum argumentorum adversantium 
aculeos sentimus, et quodammodo periclitari cau- 
sam nostram, turn demum sestuamus, et effervesei- 
mus." 

The least firm believers have often been the 
most violent persecutors. Nero persecuted the 
Christians; Marcus Antoninus persecuted them; 
but neither Nero nor Antoninus had any religious 
reason for this persecution. Antoninus, the best 
head of his time, was a sufficient skeptic to suit 
Mr. Buckle, as regards all points of the estab- 
lished religion, but his skepticism did not prevent 
him from being a persecutor. Unbelieving Popes, 
like Alexander VI. and Leo X., have persecuted. 
True toleration is not born of unbelief, as Mr. 
Buckle supposes, but of a deeper faith. Religious 
liberty has not been given to the world by skeptics, 
but by such men as Milton, Baxter, Jeremy Tay- 
lor, and Roger Williams. 

So far from general skepticism being the ante- 
cedent condition of intellectual progress and dis- 
covery, it is a sign of approaching intellectual stag- 
nation and decay. A great religious movement 
usually precedes and prepares the way for a great 
mental development. Thus the religious activity 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 223 

born of Protestantism showed its results in Eng- 
land in the age of Elizabeth, and in a general out- 
break of intellectual activity over all Europe. On 
the other hand, the skepticism of the eighteenth 
century was accompanied by comparative stagna- 
tion of thought throughout Christendom. 

IV. Mr. Buckle's View of the small Influence of 
Religion on Civilization. — Mr. Buckle thinks it 
is erroneous to suppose that religion is one of the 
prime movers of human affairs. (Vol. I. p. 183.) 
Religion, according to him, has little to do with 
human progress. In this opinion, he differs from 
nearly all other great historians and philosophical 
thinkers. In modern times, Hegel, Niebuhr, Gui- 
zot, Arnold, and Macaulay, among others, have 
discussed the part taken by religious ideas in the de- 
velopment of man, laying the greatest stress on this 
element. But Mr. Buckle denies that religion is 
one of the prime movers in human affairs. The 
Crusades have been thought to have exercised 
some influence on European civilization. But reli- 
gion was certainly the prime mover of the Crusades. 
Mohammedanism exercised some influence on the 
development of European life. But Mohamme- 
danism was an embodiment of religious ideas. 
The Protestant Reformation shook every institu- 
tion, every nation, every part of social life, in 
Christendom, and Europe rocked to its foundations 
under the influence of this great movement. But 
religion was the prime mover of it all. The Eng- 



224 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

lish Revolution turned on religious ideas. The 
rise of the Dutch Republic was determined by 
them. In one form they colonized South America 
and Mexico ; in another form, they planted New 
England. Such great constructive minds as those 
of Alfred and Charlemagne have been benevolently 
inspired by rational religion ; such dark, destruc- 
tive natures as those of Philip II. of Spain, Catha- 
rine de Medicis of France, and Mary Tudor of 
England have been malevolently inspired by fana- 
tical religion. 

On what grounds, then, does Mr. Buckle dis- 
pute the influence of religion? On two grounds 
mainly. First, he tells us that moral ideas are 
not susceptible of progress, and therefore cannot 
have exercised any perceptible influence on the 
progress of civilization. For that which does not 
change, he argues, cannot influence that which 
changes. That which has been known for thou- 
sands of years cannot be the cause of an event 
which took place for the first time only yesterday. 
" Since civilization is the product of moral and 
intellectual agencies," says Mr. Buckle, " and since 
that product is constantly changing, it cannot be 
regulated by the stationary agent ; because when 
surrounding circumstances are unchanged, a sta- 
tionary agent can produce only a stationary effect." 
On this principle, gravitation could not be the 
cause of the appearance of Donati's comet in the 
neighborhood of the sun. For gravitation is a 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 225 

stationary and uniform agent ; it cannot therefore 
produce an accelerated motion. Mr. Buckle will 
answer, that though the law of gravitation is one 
and the same in all ages, and uniform in its action, 
the result of its action may be different at different 
times, according to the position in the universe of 
the object acted upon. True ; and in like manner 
we may say, that, though religious ideas are immu- 
table, the result of their action on the human mind 
may be different, according to the position of that 
mind in relation to them. The doctrine of one 
God, the Maker and Lord of all things, was not a 
new one, or one newly discovered in the seventh 
century. Yet when applied by Mohammed to the 
Arabian mind, it was like a spark coming in con- 
tact with gunpowder. Those wandering sons of 
the desert, unknown before in the affairs of the 
world, and a negative quantity in human history, 
sprang up a terrible power, capable of overrunning 
and conquering half the earth. Religion awakened 
them ; religion organized them ; religion directed 
them. The fact that an idea is an old one is no 
proof, therefore, that it may not suddenly begin to 
act with awful efficiency on civilization and the 
destiny of man. 

The other reason given by Mr. Buckle why reli- 
gious ideas have little influence in history is, that 
the religion of a nation is symptomatic of its men- 
tal and moral state. Men take the religious ideas 
which suit them. A religion not suited to a people 



226 BUCKLE AXD HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

cannot be accepted by it : or, if accepted, has no 
influence on it. This thought, argued at consider- 
able length by Mr. Buckle, is so perfectly true as 
to be a truism. The religion of a people is no 
doubt an effect. But may it not also be a cause ? 
It. no doubt, cannot be received by a people not 
prepared for it. But does it therefore exercise no 
influence on a people which it finds prepared? 
Fire cannot explode an unexplosive material, nor 
inflame one not inflammable. But does it follow 
that it effects nothing when brought into contact 
with one which is inflammable or explosive ? A 
burning coal laid on a rock or put into the water 
produces no effect. But does this prove that the 
explosion of gunpowder is in no manner due to the 
contact of fire ? 

"The religion of mankind." says Mr. Buckle, 
M is the effect of their improvement, and not the 
cause of it." His proof is that missions and mis- 
sionaries among the heathen produce only a super- 
ficial change among barbarous and unenlightened 
tribes. Knowledge, he says, must prepare the 
way for it. There must, no doubt, be some kind 
of preparation for Christianity. But does it fol- 
low that Christianity, when its way is prepared, is 
only an effect? Why may it not be also a cause ? 
Judaism prepared the way for Christianity. But 
did not Christianity produce some effect on Juda- 
ism ? The Arab mind was prepared for Moham- 
medanism. But did not Mohammedanism produce 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 227 

some effect on the Arab mind ? Europe was pre- 
pared by various influences for Protestantism. 
But did not Protestantism produce some effects on 
Europe ? 

It might, with equal truth, and perhaps with 
greater truth, be asserted that intellectual ideas 
are the result of previous training, and that they 
are therefore an effect, and by no means a cause. 
The intellectual truths accepted by any period de- 
pend certainly on the advanced condition of human 
culture. You cannot teach logarithms to Hotten- 
tots, trigonometry to Digger Indians, or the differ- 
ential calculus to the Feejee Islanders. Hence, 
according to our author's logic, those very intel- 
lectual ideas which he thinks the only great movers 
in human affairs are really no movers at all, but 
only symptoms of the actual intellectual condition 
of a nation. 

But it is a curious fact, that, while Mr. Buckle 
considers religious ideas of so little importance in 
the history of civilization, he nevertheless devotes 
a large part of both his volumes to proving the 
great evil done to civilization by erroneous forms 
of religious opinion. Nearly the whole of his sec- 
ond volume is in fact given to showing the harm 
done in Spain and Scotland by false systems of 
religious thought. Why spend page after page 
in showing the evil influence of false religion on 
society, if religion, whether true or false, has 
scarcely any influence at all ? Why search through 



228 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

all the records of religious fanaticism and supersti- 
tion, to bring up to the day the ghosts of dead be- 
liefs, if these beliefs are, after all, powerless either 
for good or evil ? 

The second volume, the recent publication of 
which has suggested this second review of Mr. 
Buckle's work, contains much of interest and 
value, but suffers from the imperfect method of 
which we complained at the beginning of this arti- 
cle. It is chiefly devoted to a description of the 
evils resulting from priestcraft in the two countries 
of Spain and Scotland. It contains six chapters. 
The first is on the History of the Spanish Intel- 
lect from the fifth to the middle of the nineteenth 
century. The other five chapters relate to Scot- 
land. 

In the chapter on Spain Buckle attempts to show 
how loyalty and superstition began in this nation, 
and what has been the result. Of course, accord- 
ing to his theory, he is obliged to trace their origin 
to external circumstances, and he finds the cause 
of the superstition in the climate, which produced 
drought and famine, and in the earthquakes which 
alarmed the people. And here Mr. Buckle, follow- 
ing the philosophy of Lucretius, confounds religion 
and fear, and puts the occasion for the cause. But, 
beside earthquakes, the Arian heresy helped to 
create this superstition, by identifying the wars 
for national independence with those for religion, 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 229 

and so giving a great ascendency to the priests. 
Hence the Church in Spain early acquired great 
power, and, naturally allying itself with the govern- 
ment, gave rise to the sentiment of loyalty, which 
was increased by the Moorish invasion and the 
long wars which followed. Loyalty and supersti- 
tion thus became so deeply rooted in the Spanish 
mind, that they could not be eradicated by the 
efforts of the government. Nothing but know- 
ledge can cure this blind and servile loyalty and 
this abject superstition, and while Spain continues 
sunk in ignorance it must always remain supersti- 
tious and submissive. 

Some difficulties, however, suggest themselves 
in the way of this very simple explanation. If 
superstitious loyalty to Church and king comes 
from earthquakes, why are not the earthquake 
regions of the West Indies and of South America 
more loyal, instead of being in a state of chronic 
revolution ? And how came Scotland to be so 
diseased with loyalty and superstition, when she 
is so free from earthquakes ? And if knowledge 
is such a certain cure for superstition, why was not 
Spain cured by the flood of light which she, alone 
of all European countries, enjoyed in the Middle 
Ages ? Spain was for a long time the source of 
science and art to all Europe, whose Christian 
sons resorted to her universities and libraries for 
instruction. There was taught to English, French, 
and German students the philosophy of Aristotle, 



230 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

the Grseco- Arabic literature, mathematics, and nat- 
ural history. The numerals, gunpowder, paper, 
and other inventions of the Arabs, passed into 
Europe from Spain. She possessed, therefore, 
that knowledge of physical laws which Mr. Buckle 
declares to be the only cure for superstition. Yet 
she was not cured. The nation which, according 
to his theory, ought to have been soonest delivered 
from superstition, according to his statements has 
retained its yoke longer than any other. 

From Spain Mr. Buckle passes to Scotland, 
where he finds a still more complicated problem. 
Superstition and loyalty ought to go together, he 
thinks, — and usually do ; but in Scotland they are 
divorced. The Scotch have always been supersti- 
tious, but disloyal. To the explanation of this fact 
Mr. Buckle bends his energies of thought, and of 
course is able to find a theory to account for it. 
This theory we shall not stop to detail ; it is too 
complex, and at the same time too superficial, to 
dwell upon. Its chief point is that the Protestant 
noblemen and Protestant clergy quarreled about 
the wealth of the Catholic Church, and so there 
was in Scotland a complete rupture between the 
two classes elsewhere in alliance. Thus " the 
clergy, finding themselves despised by the govern- 
ing class, united themselves heartily with the peo- 
ple, and advocated democratic principles." Such 
is the explanation given to the course of history in 
a great nation. A quarrel between its noblemen 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 231 

and its ministers (who are of course represented as 
mercenary self-seekers) determines its permanent 
character ! 

Mr. Buckle, to whom the love of plunder appears 
as the cause of what other men regard as loyalty 
or religion, explains by the same fact the loyalty of 
the Highlanders to King Charles. They thought 
that, if he conquered, he would allow them to plun- 
der the Lowlanders once more. This is Buckle's 
explanation. An ethnologist would have remem- 
bered the fact that the Gaels are pure-blooded 
Kelts, and that the Kelts pur sang are everywhere 
distinguished for loyalty to their chiefs. 

Mr. Buckle encounters another difficulty in 
Scottish history in this, that though a new and 
splendid literature arose in Scotland at the begin- 
ning of the eighteenth century, it was unable to 
diminish national superstition. It was thoroughly 
skeptical, and yet did not produce the appropriate 
effect of skepticism. So that at this point one of Mr. 
Buckle's four great laws of history seems to break 
down. For a moment he appears discouraged, 
and laments, with real pathos, the limitations of 
the human intellect. But in the next chapter he 
addresses himself again to the solution of his two- 
fold problem, viz. : " 1st, that the same people 
should be liberal in their politics and illiberal in 
their religion ; and, 2d, that their free and skepti- 
cal literature in the eighteenth century should 
have been unable to lessen their religious illiber- 
ality." 



232 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

In approaching this part of his task, in the fifth 
chapter, our author gives a very elaborate and 
highly colored picture of the religion of Scotland. 
It is too well done. Like some of Macaulay's 
descriptions, it is so very striking as to impress us 
almost inevitably as a caricature. Every state- 
ment in which the horrors and cruelties of Calvin- 
ism are described is indeed reinforced by ample 
citations or plentiful references in the footnotes. 
But some of these seem capable of a different 
inference from that drawn in the text. For in- 
stance, he charges the Scottish clergy with teach- 
ing, that, though the arrangements originally 
made by the Deity to punish his creatures were 
ample, " they were insufficient ; and hell, not 
being big enough to contain the countless victims 
incessantly poured into it, had in these latter days 
been enlarged. There was now sufficient room." 
He supports the charge by this reference to Aber- 
nethy, — " Hell has enlarged itself," — apparently 
not being aware that Abernethy was merely quot- 
ing from Isaiah. He says that to write poetry 
was considered by the Scotch clergy to be a griev- 
ous offence, and worthy of special condemnation. 
He supports his statement by this reference : " A 
mastership in a grammar school was offered in 
1767 to John Wilson, the author of fc Clyde ' " (a 
poet, by the by, not found among the twenty John 
Wilsons commemorated by Watt). " But, says 
his biographer, the magistrates and ministers of 



BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 233 

Greenock thought fit, before they would admit 
Mr. Wilson to the superintendence of the gram- 
mar school, to stipulate that he should abandon 
8 the profane and unprofitable art of poem-mak- 
ing.' " This fact, however, by no means proves 
that poetry was considered, theologically, a sin, 
for perhaps it was regarded practically as only a 
disqualification. It is to be feared that many of 
our school committees now — country shopkeepers, 
perhaps, or city aldermen — would, apart from 
Calvinism, think that a poet must be necessarily a 
dreamer and an unpractical man. 

A few exaggerations o£ this kind there may be. 
But, on the whole, the account seems to be cor- 
rectly given ; and it is one which will do good. 

In the remaining portion of the second volume 
Mr. Buckle gives a very vigorous description of 
the intellectual progress of the Scotch during the 
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. His ac- 
count of Adam Smith as a writer is peculiarly 
brilliant. His views of Hume and Reid are ably 
drawn. Thence he proceeds to discuss the dis- 
coveries of Black and Leslie in natural philosophy, 
of Smith and Hutton in geology, of Cavendish in 
chemistry, of Cullen and Hunter in physiology 
and pathology. These discussions are interesting, 
and show a great range of knowledge and power 
of study in the writer. Yet they are episodes, and 
have little bearing on the main course of his 
thought. 



234 BUCKLE AND HIS THEORY OF AVERAGES 

We have thus given a cursory survey of these 
volumes. We do not think Buckle's philosophy 
sound, his method good, or his doctrines tenable. 
Yet we cannot but sympathize with one who has 
devoted his strength and youth with such untiring 
industry to such a great enterprise. And we must 
needs be touched with the plaintive confession 
which breaks from his wearied mind and exhausted 
hope in the last volume, when he accepts the de- 
feat of his early endeavor, and submits to the 
disappointment of his youthful hope. We should 
be glad to quote the entire passage, 1 because it is 
the best in the book, and because he expresses in 
it, in the most condensed form, his ideas and pur- 
poses as an historic writer. But our limited space 
allows us only to commend it to the special atten- 
tion of the reader. 

1 See Vol. II. pp. 255-259, American edition. 



VOLTAIRE l 

Mr. Parton has given us in these volumes 2 
another of his interesting and instructive biogra- 
phies. Not as interesting, indeed, as some others, 
— for example, as his life of Andrew Jackson ; 
nor as instructive as his lives of Franklin and of 
Jefferson. The nature of the case made this im- 
possible. The story of Jackson had never been 
told till Mr. Parton undertook it. It was a his- 
tory of frontier life, of strange adventures, of 
desperate courage, of a force of character which 
conquered all obstacles and achieved extraordinary 
results ; a story 

" Of moving accidents by flood and field, 
Of hair-breadth 'scapes i' the imminent deadly breach, 
Of being taken by the insolent foe." 

No such interest attaches to the " Life of Voltaire." 
His most serious adventure was being shut up in 
the Bastille for a pasquinade, and being set free 
again on his solemn protestation, true or false, 
that he never wrote it. It is an old story, told a 
thousand times, with all its gloss, if it ever had any, 

1 The Atlantic Monthly, August, 1881. 

2 Life of Voltaire, by James Parton. In two vols. Boston: 
Houghton, Mifflin & Co. 1886. 



236 VOLTAIRE 

quite worn off. The " Life of Franklin," which, 
on the whole, we think the best of Parton's biogra- 
phies, was full of interest and instruction of an- 
other kind. It was the life of a builder, — of one 
who gave his great powers to construction, to 
building up new institutions and new sciences, to 
the discovery of knowledge and the creation of 
national life. Voltaire was a diffuser of know- 
ledge already found, but he had not the patience 
nor the devotion of a discoverer. His gift was 
not to construct good institutions, but to destroy 
bad ones, — a work the interest of which is neces- 
sarily ephemeral. No wonder, therefore, that Mr. 
Parton, with all his practiced skill as a biographer, 
has not been able to give to the story of Voltaire 
the thrilling interest which he imparted to that of 
Franklin and of Jackson. 

We gladly take the present opportunity to add 
our recognition of Mr. Parton's services to those 
which have come to him from other quarters. A 
writer of unequal merit, and one whose judgment 
is often biased by his prejudices, he nevertheless 
has done much to show how biography should be 
written. Of all forms of human writing there is 
none which ought to be at once so instructive and 
so interesting as this, but in the large majority of 
instances it is the most vapid and empty. The 
good biographies, in all languages, are so few that 
they can almost be counted on the fingers ; but 
these are among the most precious books in the 



VOLTAIRE 237 

literature of mankind. The story of Ruth, the 
Odyssey of Homer, Plutarch's lives, the Memora- 
bilia of Xenophon, the life of Agricola, the Con- 
fessions of Augustine, among the ancients ; and, in 
modern times, Boswell's "Johnson," the autobio- 
graphies of Alfieri, Benvenuto Cellini, Franklin, 
Goethe, Voltaire's " Charles XII.," and Southey's 
" Life of Wesley " are specimens of what may 
be accomplished in this direction. It has been 
thought that any man can write a biography, but 
it requires genius to understand genius. How 
much intelligence is necessary to collect with dis- 
crimination the significant facts of a human life ; 
to penetrate to the law of which they are the ex- 
pression ; to give the picturesque proportions to 
every part, to arrange the foreground, the middle 
distance, and the background of the panorama ; to 
bring out in proper light and shadow the features 
and deeds of the hero ! Few biographers take 
this trouble. They content themselves with col- 
lecting the letters written by and to their subject ; 
sweeping together the facts of his life, important 
or otherwise ; arranging them in some kind of 
chronological order ; and then having this printed 
and bound up in one or two heavy volumes. 

To all this many writers of biography add an- 
other fault, which is almost a fatal one. They 
treat their subject de haut en has, preferring to 
look down upon him rather than to look up to 
him. They occupy themselves in criticising his 



238 VOLTAIRE 

faults and pointing out his deficiencies, till they 
forget to mention what he has accomplished to 
make him worthy of having his life written at all. 
We lately saw a life of Pope treated in this style. 
One unacquainted with Pope, after reading it, 
would say, " If he was such a contemptible fellow, 
and his writings so insignificant, why should we 
have to read his biography?" Thomas Carlyle 
has the great merit of leading the way in the 
opposite direction, and of thus initiating a new 
style of biography. The old method was for the 
writer to regard himself as a judge on the bench, 
and the subject of his biography as a prisoner at 
the bar. Carlyle, in his " Life of Schiller," showed 
himself a loving disciple, sitting at the feet of his 
master. We recollect that when this work first 
appeared there were only a few copies known to be 
in this country. One was in the possession of an 
eminent professor in Harvard College, of whom 
the present writer borrowed it. On returning it, 
he was asked what he thought of it, and replied 
that he considered it written with much enthusi- 
asm. " Yes," responded the professor, " I myself 
thought it rather extravagant." Enthusiasm in a 
biographer was then considered to be the same as 
extravagance. But this hero-worship, which is 
the charm in Plutarch, Xenophon, and Bosw r ell, 
inspired a like interest in Carlyle's portraits of 
Schiller, Goethe, Richter, Burns, and the actors in 
the French Revolution. So true is his own warn- 



VOLTAIRE 239 

ing : " Friend, if you wish me to take an interest 
in what you say, be so kind as to take some in- 
terest in it yourself " — a golden maxim, to be 
kept in mind by all historians, writers of travels, 
biographers, preachers, and teachers. A social 
success may sometimes be accomplished by assum- 
ing the blase air of the Roman emperor who said, 
" Omnia fui, nihil expedit ; " but this tone is 
ruinous for one who wishes the ear of the public. 

Since the days of Carlyle, others have written 
in the same spirit, allowing themselves to take 
more or less interest in the man whose life they 
were relating. So Macaulay, in his sketches of 
Clive, Hastings, Chatham, Pym, and Hampden ; 
so Lewes, in his " Life of Goethe ; " and so Parton, 
in his various biographies. 

In some respects Mr. Parton's biography re- 
minds us of Macaulay's History. Both have been 
credited with the same qualities, both charged 
with the same defects. Both are indefatigable in 
collecting material from all quarters, — from other 
histories and biographies, memoirs, letters, news- 
papers, broadsides, and personal communications 
gathered in many out-of-the-way localities. Both 
have the power of discarding insignificant details 
and retaining what is suggestive and picturesque. 
Both, therefore, have the same supreme merit of 
being interesting. Both have strong prejudices, 
take sides earnestly, forget that they are narrators, 
and begin to plead as attorneys and advocates. 



240 VOLTAIRE 

Both have been accused, rightly or wrongly, of 
grave inaccuracies. But their defects will not pre- 
vent them from holding their place as teachers of 
the English-speaking public. English and Ameri- 
can readers will long continue to think of Marl- 
borough as Macaulay represents him ; of Jackson 
and Jefferson as Parton describes them. Such 
Rembrandt-like portraits fix the attention by their 
strange chiaro-oscuro. They may not be like na- 
ture, but they take the place of nature. The most 
remarkable instance of this kind is the representa- 
tion of Tiberius by Tacitus, which has caused 
mankind, until very recently, to consider Tiberius 
a monster of licentiousness and cruelty, in spite of 
the almost self-evident absurdity and self-contra- 
diction of this assumption. 1 Limners with such a 
terrible power of portraiture should be very care- 
ful how they use it, and not abuse the faculty in 
the interest of their prejudices. 

If Mr. Parton resembles Macaulay in some re- 
spects, in one point, at least, he is like Carlyle : 
that is, that his last hero is the least interesting. 
From Schiller and Goethe to Frederic the Great 
was a fall; and so from Franklin to Voltaire. 
Carlyle tells us what a weary task he had with his 
Prussian king, and we think that Mr. Parton's 
labors over the patriarch of the eighteenth-century 

1 Voltaire himself, with his acute perception, seems to have 
been one of the first to discover the absurdity of the representa- 
tion of Tiberius by Tacitus. 



VOLTAIRE 241 

literature must have been equally distressing. At 
a distance, Voltaire is a striking phenomenon : the 
most brilliant wit of almost any period ; the most 
prolific writer ; a successful dramatist, historian, 
biographer, story-teller, controversialist, lyrical 
poet, student of science. " Truly, a universal 
genius, a mighty power ! " we say. But look 
more closely, and this genius turns into talent ; 
this encyclopaedic knowledge becomes only super- 
ficial half knowledge ; this royalty is a sham roy- 
alty; it does not lead the world, but follows it. 
The work into which Voltaire put his heart was 
destruction — the destruction of falsehoods, bigo- 
tries, cruelties, and shams. It was an important 
duty, and some one had to do it. But it was 
temporary, and one of which the interest is soon 
over. If Luther and the other reformers had 
aimed at only destroying the Church of Rome, 
their influence would have speedily ceased. But 
they rebuilt, as they destroyed ; the sword in one 
hand, and the trowel in the other. They destroyed 
in order to build ; they took away the outgrown 
house, to put another in its place. Voltaire did 
not go so far as that ; he wanted no new church 
in the place of the old one. 

Voltaire and Rousseau are often spoken of as 
though they were fellow-workers, and are associ- 
ated in many minds as sharing the same convic- 
tions. Nothing can be more untrue. They were 
radically opposite in the very structure of their 



242 VOLTAIRE 

minds, and their followers and admirers are 
equally different. If all men can be divided into 
Platonists and Aristotelians, they may be in like 
manner classified as those who prefer Voltaire to 
Rousseau, and vice versa. Both were indeed the- 
ists, and both opposed to the popular religion of 
their time. Both were brilliant writers, masters 
of the French language, listened to by the people, 
and with a vast popularity. Both were more or 
less persecuted for their religious heresies. So far 
they resemble each other. But these are only 
external resemblances ; radically and inwardly 
they were polar opposites. What attracted one 
repelled the other. Voltaire w r as a man of the 
world, fond of society and social pleasures ; the 
child of his time, popular, a universal favorite. 
Rousseau shrank from society, hated its fashions, 
did not enjoy its pleasures, and belonged to an- 
other epoch than the eighteenth century. Rous- 
seau believed in human nature, and thought that 
if we could return to our natural condition the 
miseries of life would cease. Voltaire despised 
human nature ; he forever repeated that the ma- 
jority of men were knaves and fools. Rousseau 
distrusted education and culture as they are com- 
monly understood; but to Voltaire's mind they 
were the only matters of any value, — all that 
made life worth living. Rousseau was more like 
Pascal than like Voltaire ; far below Pascal, no 
doubt, in fixed moral principles and ascetic virtue. 



VOLTAIRE 243 

Yet he resembled him in his devotion to ideas, his 
enthusiasm for some better day to come. Both 
were out of place in their own time ; both were 
prophets crying in the wilderness. Put Voltaire 
between Pascal and Rousseau, and it would be 
something like the tableau of Goethe between 
Basedow and Lavater. 

u Prophete rechts, Prophete links, 
Das Weltkind in der Mitte." 

The difference between Voltaire and Rousseau was 
really that between a man of talent and a man of 
genius. Voltaire, brilliant, adroit, full of resource, 
quick as a flash, versatile, with immense powers of 
working, with a life full of literary successes, has 
not left behind him a single masterpiece. He 
comes in everywhere second best. As a tragedian 
he is inferior to Racine ; as a wit and comic writer 
far below Moliere ; and he is quite surpassed as a 
historian and biographer by many modern French 
authors. No germinating ideas are to be found in 
his writings, no seed corn for future harvests. » He 
thought himself a philosopher, and was so re- 
garded by others ; but neither had his philosophy 
any roots to it. A sufficient proof of this is the 
fact that he shared the superficial optimism of the 
English deists, as expressed by Bolingbroke and 
Pope, until the Lisbon earthquake, by destroying 
thirty thousand people, changed his whole mental 
attitude. Till then he could say with Pope, 
" Whatever is, is right." After that, most things 



244 VOLTAIRE 

which are, appeared to him fatally and hopelessly 
wrong. That thirty thousand persons should per- 
ish in a few minutes, in great suffering, he thought 
inconsistent with the goodness of God. But take 
the whole world over, thirty thousand people are 
continually perishing, in the course of a few hours 
or days. What difference does it make, in a 
philosophical point of view, if they die all at once 
in a particular place, or at longer intervals in 
many places ? Voltaire asks, " What crime had 
those infants committed who lie crushed on their 
mother's breasts ? " What crime, we reply, have 
the infants committed who have been dying by 
millions, in suffering, since the world began ? 
" Was Lisbon," he asks, " more wicked than 
Paris ? " But had Voltaire never noticed before 
that wicked people often live on in health and 
pleasure, while the good suffer and die ? Voltaire 
did not see, what it requires very little philosophy 
to discover, that a Lisbon earthquake really pre- 
sents no more difficulty to the reason than the 
suffering and death of a single child. 

Another fact which shows the shallow nature of 
Voltaire's way of thinking is his expectation of 
destroying Christianity by a combined attack upon 
it of all the wits and philosophers. Mr. Parton 
tells us that " l'lnfame," which Voltaire expected 
to crush, " was not religion, nor the Christian 
religion, nor the Roman Catholic Church. It was," 
he says, " religion claiming supernatural author- 



VOLTAIRE 245 

ity, and enforcing that claim by pains and penal- 
ties" No doubt it was the spirit of intolerance 
and persecution which excited his indignation. 
But the object of that indignation was not the 
abstraction which Mr. Parton presents to us. It 
was something far more concrete. There is no 
doubt that Voltaire confounded Christianity with 
the churches about him, and these with their 
abuses ; and thus his object was to sweep away all 
positive religious institutions, and to leave in their 
place a philosophic deism. Else what meaning in 
his famous boast that " it required twelve men to 
found a belief, which it would need only one man 
to destroy"? What meaning, otherwise, in his 
astonishment that Locke, " having in one book so 
profoundly traced the development of the under- 
standing, could so degrade his own understanding 
in another "? — referring, as Mr. Morley believes, 
to Locke's " Reasonableness of Christianity." Vol- 
taire saw around him Christianity represented by 
cruel bigots, ecclesiastics living in indolent luxury, 
narrow-minded and hard-hearted priests. That 
was all the Christianity he saw with his sharp per- 
ceptive faculty ; and he had no power of penetrat- 
ing into the deeper life of the soul which these 
corruptions misrepresented. We do not blame 
him for this ; he was made so ; but it was a fatal 
defect in a reformer. The first work of a re- 
former is to discover the truth and the good latent 
amid the abuses he wishes to reform, and for the 



246 VOLTAIRE 

sake of which men endure the evil. A Buddhist 
proverb says, " The human mind is like a leech : 
it never lets go with its tail till it has taken hold 
somewhere else with its head." Distinguish the 
good in a system from the evil ; show how the 
good can be preserved, though the evil is aban- 
doned, and then you may hope to effect a truly 
radical reform. Radicalism means going to the 
roots of anything. Voltaire was incapable of be- 
coming a radical reformer of the Christian Church, 
because he had in himself no faculty by which he 
could appreciate the central forces of Christianity. 
Mr. Morley says that Voltaire " has said no word, 
nor even shown an indirect appreciation of any 
word said by another, which stirs and expands 
that indefinite exaltation known as the love of 
God," " or of the larger word holiness." " Through 
the affronts which his reason received from certain 
pretensions, both in the writers and in some of 
those whose actions they commemorated, this sub- 
lime trait in the Bible, in both portions of it, was 
unhappily lost to Voltaire. He had no ear for the 
finer vibrations of the spiritual voice." And so 
also speaks Carlyle : " It is a much more serious 
ground of offense that he intermeddled in religion 
without being himself, in any measure, religious ; 
that he entered the temple and continued there 
with a levity which, in any temple where men 
worship, can beseem no brother man ; that, in a 
word, he ardently, and with long-continued effort. 



VOLTAIRE 247 

warred against Christianity, without understanding 
beyond the mere superficies of what Christianity 
was." In fact, in the organization of Voltaire, 
the organ of reverence, " the crown of the whole 
moral nature," seems to have been at its minimum. 
A sense of justice there was ; an ardent sympathy 
with the oppressed, a generous hatred of the op- 
pressor, a ready devotion of time, thought, wealth, 
to the relief of the down-trodden victim. There- 
fore, with such qualities, Voltaire, by the addi- 
tional help of his indefatigable energy, often suc- 
ceeded in plucking the prey from the jaws of the 
lion. He was able to defeat the combined powers 
of Church and State in his advocacy of some indi- 
vidual sufferer, in his battle against some single 
wrong. But his long war against the Catholic 
Church in France left it just where it was when 
that war began. Its power to-day in France is 
greater than it was then, because it is a purer and 
better institution than it was then. That Sphinx 
still sits by the roadside propounding its riddle. 
Voltaire was not the QEdipus who could solve it, 
and so the life of that mystery remains untouched 
until now. 

The Henriade has often been considered the 
great epic poem of France. This merely means 
that France has never produced a great epic poem. 
The Henriade is artificial, prosaic, and has no 
particle of the glow, the fire, the prolonged, en- 
thusiasm, which alone can give an epic poem to 



248 VOLTAIRE 

mankind. In this sentence all competent critics 
are agreed. 

Voltaire was busy with literature during his 
whole life. He not only wrote continually him- 
self, but he was a critic of the writings of others. 
His mind was essentially critical, — formed to 
analyze, discriminate sharply, compare, and judge 
by some universal standard of taste. Here, if 
anywhere, he ought to be at his best ; here, if in 
any department, he should stand at the head of 
the world's board of literary censors. But here, 
again, he is not even second-rate ; here, more than 
elsewhere, he show r s how superficial are his judg- 
ments. He tests every writer by the French 
standard in the eighteenth century. Every word 
which Goethe, Schiller, Lessing, have said of 
other writers is full of value and interest to-day. 
But who would go to Voltaire for light on any 
book or author ? We have an instinctive but cer- 
tain conviction that all his views are limited by 
his immediate environment, perverted by his per- 
sonal prejudices. Thus, he prefers Ariosto to the 
Odyssey, and Tasso's Jerusalem to the Iliad. 1 
His inability to comprehend the greatness of 
Shakespeare is well known. He is filled with 
indignation because a French critic had called 
Shakespeare " the god of the stage." " The blood 
boils in my old veins," says he ; " and what is 
frightful to think of, it was I myself who first 
1 Essai sur les Moeurs, ch. cxxi. 



VOLTAIRE 249 

showed to Frenchmen the few pearls to be found 
in the dunghill." 1 Chesterfield's Letters to his 
Son he considers " the best book upon education 
ever written." 2 This is the book in which a 
father teaches his son the art of polite falsehood, 
of which Dr. Johnson says that " it shows how 
grace can be united with wickedness," — the book 
whose author is called by De Vere the philosopher 
of flattery and dissimulation. He admitted that 
there were some good things in Milton, but speaks 
of his conceptions as " odd and extravagant." 3 
He thought Condorcet much superior to Pascal. 
The verses of Helvetius he believed better than 
any but those of Racine. The era was what Ville- 
main calls " the golden age of mediocre writers ; " 
and Voltaire habitually praised them all. But 
these writers mostly belonged to a mutual admira- 
tion society. The anatomist Tissot, in one of his 
physiological works, says that the genius of Dide- 
rot came to show to mankind how every variety of 
talent could be brought to perfection in one man. 
Diderot, in his turn, went into frantic delight over 
the novels of Richardson. " Since I have read 
these works," he says, " I make them my touch- 
stone ; those who do not admire them are self- 
condemned. O my friends, what majestic dramas 
are these three, Clarissa, Sir Charles Grandison, 
and Pamela ! " Such was the eighteenth century ; 
and Voltaire belonged to it with all the intensity 
1 Parton, ii. 549. 2 Ibid., ii. 551. 3 Ibid., i. 232. 



250 VOLTAIRE 

of his ardent nature. He may be said never to 
have seen or foreseen anything better. Living on 
the very verge of a great social revolution, he does 
not appear to have suspected what its nature 
would be, even if he suspected its approach. The 
cruelties of the Church exasperated him, but the 
political condition of society, the misery of the 
peasants, the luxury of the nobles, the despotism 
of the king, left him unmoved. He was singularly 
deficient in any conception of the value of political 
liberty or of free institutions. If he had lived to 
see the coming of the Revolution, it would have 
utterly astounded him. His sympathies were with 
an enlightened aristocracy, not with the people. 
In this, too, he was the man of his time, and be- 
longed to the middle of his century, not the end of 
it. He saw and lamented the evils of bad govern- 
ment. He pointed out the miseries produced by 
war. He abhorred and denounced the military 
spirit. He called on the clergy, in the name of 
their religion, to join him in his righteous appeals 
against this great curse of mankind. " Where," 
he asks, " in the five or six thousand sermons of 
Massillon, are there two in which anything is said 
against the scourge of war?" He rebukes the 
philosophers and moralists, also, for their delin- 
quency in this matter, and replies forcibly to Mon- 
tesquieu's argument that self-defense sometimes 
makes it necessary to begin the attack on a neigh- 
boring nation. But he does not go back to trace 



VOLTAIRE 251 

the evil to its root in the absence of self-govern- 
ment. In a letter to the King of Prussia he says, 
" When I asked you to become the deliverer of 
Greece, I did not mean to have you restore the 
democracy. I do not love the rule of the rabble " 
(jgouvernement cle la canaille). Again, writing to 
the same, in January, 1757, he says, " Your ma- 
jesty will confer a great benefit by destroying this 
infamous superstition [Christianity] ; I do not say 
among the canaille, who do not deserve to be en- 
lightened, and who ought to be kept down under 
all yokes, but among honest people, people who 
think. Give white bread to the children, but only 
black bread to the dogs." In 1762, writing to the 
Marquis d'Argens, he says, " The Turks say that 
their Koran has sometimes the face of an angel, 
sometimes the face of a beast. This description 
suits our time. There are a few philosophers, — 
they have the face of an angel; all else much 
resembles that of a beast." Again, he says to 
Helvetius, " Consider no man your neighbor but 
the man who thinks ; look on all other men as 
wolves, foxes, and deer." "We shall soon see," 
he writes to D'Alembert, " new heavens and a 
new earth, — I mean for honest people ; for as to 
the canaille, the stupidest heaven and earth is all 
they are fit for." The real government of nations, 
according to him, should be administered by abso- 
lute kings, in the interest of freethinkers. 

It is true that after Rousseau had published his 



252 VOLTAIRE 

trumpet-call in behalf of democratic rights, Vol- 
taire began to waver. It has been remarked that 
" at the very time when he expressed an increasing 
ill-will against the person of the author of ' Emile,' 
he was irresistibly attracted to the principal doc- 
trines of Eousseau. He entered, as if in spite of 
himself, into paths toward which his feet were 
never before directed. As if to revenge himself 
for coming under this salutary influence, he pur- 
sued Eousseau with blind anger." 1 He harshly 
attacked the Social Contract, but accepted the 
sovereignty of the people ; saying that " civil gov- 
ernment is the will of all, executed by a single 
one, or by several, in virtue of the laws which all 
have enacted." He, however, speedily restricted 
this democratic principle by confining the right of 
making laws to the owners of real estate. He de- 
clares that those who have neither house nor land 
ought not to have any voice in the matter. He 
now began (in 1764) to look forward to the end 
of monarchies, and to expect a revolution. Never- 
theless, he plainly declares, " The pretended 
equality of man is a pernicious chimera. If there 
were not thirty laborers to one master, the earth 
would not be cultivated." But in practical and 
humane reforms Voltaire took the lead, and did 
good work. He opposed examination by torture, 
the punishment of death for theft, the confiscation 
of the property of the condemned, the penalties 

1 Martin's History of France, 



VOLTAIRE 253 

against heretics ; secret trials ; praised trial by 
jury, civil marriage, right of divorce, and reforms 
in the direction of hygiene and education. 

And, above all, whatever fault may be found 
with Voltaire, let us never cease to appreciate his 
generous efforts in behalf of the unfortunate vic- 
tims of the atrocious bigotry which then prevailed 
in France. It is not necessary to dwell here on 
the cases of Calas, the Sirvens, La Barre, and the 
Count de Lally. They are fully told by Mr. Par- 
ton, and to his account we refer our readers. In 
1762 the Protestant pastor Rochette was hanged, 
by order of the Parliament of Toulouse, for having 
exercised his ministry in Languedoc. At the same 
time three young gentlemen, Protestants, were be- 
headed, for having taken arms to defend them- 
selves from being slaughtered by the Catholics. 
In 1762, the Protestant merchant Calas, an aged 
and worthy citizen of Toulouse, was tortured and 
broken on the wheel, on a wholly unsupported 
charge of having killed his son to keep him from 
turning Catholic. A Protestant girl named Sirven 
was, about the same time, taken from her parents, 
and shut up in a convent, to compel her to change 
her religion. She escaped, and perished by acci- 
dent during her flight. The parents were accused 
of having killed her to keep her from becoming a 
Catholic. They escaped, but the wife died of ex- 
posure and want. In 1766 a crucifix was injured 
by some wanton persons. The Bishop of Amiens 



254 VOLTAIRE 

called out for vengeance. Two young officers, 
eighteen years old, were accused. One escaped ; 
the other, La Barre, was condemned to have his 
tongue cut out, his right hand cut off, and to be 
burned alive. The sentence was commuted to death 
by decapitation. Voltaire, seventy years old, de- 
voted himself with masterly ability and untiring 
energy to save these victims ; and when he failed 
in that, to show the falsehood of the charges, and 
to obtain a revision of the judgments. He used 
all means : personal appeals to men in power and 
to female favorites, eloquence, wit, pathos in every 
form of writing. He called on all his friends to 
aid him. He poured a flood of light into these 
dark places of iniquity. His generous labors were 
crowned with success. He procured a reversal of 
these iniquitous decisions ; in some cases a resto- 
ration of the confiscated property, and a public 
recognition of the innocence of those condemned. 
Without knowing it, he was acting as a disciple 
of Jesus. Perhaps he may have met in the other 
world with the great leader of humanity, whom he 
never understood below, and been surprised to hear 
him say, " Inasmuch as thou hast done it to the 
least of my little ones, thou hast done it unto me." 
Carlyle tells us that the chief quality of Voltaire 
was adroitness. He denies that he was really a 
great man, and says that in one essential mark 
of greatness he was wholly wanting, that is, ear- 
nestness. He adds that Voltaire was by birth a 



VOLTAIRE 255 

mocker ; that this was the irresistible bias of his 
disposition ; that the first question with him was 
always not what is true but what is false, not what 
is to be loved but what is to be contemned. He 
was shallow without heroism, full of pettiness, full 
of vanity ; " not a great man, but only a great per- 
sifleur" 

But certainly some other qualities than these 
were essential to produce the immense influence 
which he exerted in his own time, and since. Be- 
side the extreme adroitness of which Carlyle speaks, 
he had as exhaustless an energy as was ever granted 
to any of the sons of men. He was never happy 
except when he was at work. He worked at home, 
he worked when visiting, he worked in his carriage, 
he worked at hotels. Amid annoyances and dis- 
turbances which would have paralyzed the thought 
and pen of others, Voltaire labored on. Upon his 
sick bed, in extreme debility and in old age, that 
untiring pen was ever in motion, and whatever 
came from it interested all mankind. Besides the 
innumerable books, tracts, and treatises which fill 
the volumes of his collected works, there are said 
to be in existence fourteen thousand of his letters, 
half of which have never been printed. But this 
was only a part of the outcome of his terrible vital- 
ity. He was also an enterprising and energetic 
man of business. He speculated in the funds, lent 
money on interest, fitted out ships, bought and sold 
real estate, solicited and obtained pensions. In this 



256 VOLTAIRE 

way he changed his patrimony of about two hun- 
dred thousand francs to an annual income of the 
same amount, — equal to at least one hundred 
thousand dollars a year at the present time. He 
was determined to be rich, and he became so ; not 
because he loved money for itself, nor because he 
was covetous. He gave money freely ; he used it 
in large ways. He sought wealth as a means of 
self-defense, — to protect himself against the perse- 
cution which his attacks on the Church might bring 
upon him. He also had, like a great writer of the 
present century, Walter Scott, the desire of being 
a large landed proprietor and lord of a manor; 
and, like Scott, he became one, reigning at Ferney 
as Scott ruled at Abbotsford. 

In defending himself against his persecutors he 
used other means not so legitimate. One of his 
methods was systematic falsehood. He first con- 
cealed, and then denied, the authorship of any 
works which would expose him to danger. He took 
the tone of injured innocence. For example, he 
had worked with delight, during twenty years, on 
his wretched " Pucelle." To write new lines in it, 
or a new canto, was his refreshment ; to read them 
to his friends gave him the most intense satisfac- 
tion. But when the poem found its way into print, 
with what an outcry he denies the authorship, al- 
most before he is charged with it. He assumes 
the air of calumniated virtue. The charge, he de- 
clares, is one of the infamous inventions of his ene- 



VOLTAIRE 257 

mies. He writes to the " Journal Encyclopedique," 
" The crowning point of their devilish manoeuvres 
is the edition of a poem called 4 La Pucelle d'Or- 
leans.' The editor has the face to attribute this 
work to the author of the 4 Henriade,' the ' Zaire,' 
the ' Merope,' the ' Alzire,' the ' Siecle de Louis 
XIV.' He dares to ascribe to this author the flat- 
test, meanest, and most gross work which can come 
from the press. My pen refuses to copy the tissue 
of silly and abominable obscenities of this work 
of darkness." When the " Dictionnaire Philoso- 
phique" began to appear, he wrote to D'Alembert, 
" As soon as any danger arises, I beg you will let 
me know, that I may disavow the work in all the 
public papers with my usual candor and innocence." 
Mr. Parton tells us that he had a hundred and 
eight pseudonyms. He signed his pamphlets A 
Benedictine, The Archbishop of Canterbury, A 
Quaker, Rev. Josias Roussette, the Abbe Lilladet, 
the Abbe Bigorre, the Pastor Bourn. He was also 
ready to tell a downright lie when it suited his con- 
venience. 

When " Candide " was printed, in 1758, he 
wrote, as Mr. Parton tells us, to a friendly pastor 
in Geneva, " I have at length read i Candide.' 
People must have lost their senses to attribute to 
me that pack of nonsense. I have, thank God, 
better occupation. This optimism [of Pangloss] 
obviously destroys the foundation of our holy re- 
ligion." Our holy religion ! 



258 VOLTAIRE 

An excuse may be found for these falsehoods. 
A writer, it may be said, has a right to his in- 
cognito ; if so, he has a right to protect it by deny- 
ing the authorship of a book when charged with it. 
This is doubtful morality, but Voltaire went far 
beyond this. He volunteered his denials. He as- 
serted in every way, with the most solemn assevera- 
tions, that he was not the author of a book which 
he had written with delight. But this was not the 
worst. He not only told these author's lies, but 
he was a deliberate hypocrite, professing faith in 
Christianity, receiving its sacraments, asking spir- 
itual help from the Pope, and begging for relics 
from the Vatican, at the very time that he was 
hoping by strenuous efforts to destroy both Catholi- 
cism and Christianity. 

When he was endeavoring to be admitted to a 
place in the French Academy, he wrote thus to the 
Bishop of Mirepoix : 1 " Thanks to Heaven, my re- 
ligion teaches me to know how to suffer. The 
God who founded it, as soon as he deigned to be- 
come man, was of all men the most persecuted. 
After such an example, it is almost a crime to 
complain. ... I can say, before God who hears 
me, that I am a good citizen and a true Catholic. 
... I have written many pages sanctified by re- 
ligion." In this Mr. Parton admits that he went 
too far. 

When at Colmar, as a measure of self-protec- 

1 Parton. i. 461. 



VOLTAIRE 259 

tion, he resolved to commune at Easter. Mr. Par- 
ton says that Voltaire had pensions and rents to 
the amount of sixty thousand livres annually, of 
which the king could deprive him by a stroke 
of the pen. So he determined to prove himself 
a good Catholic by taking the sacraments. As a 
necessary preliminary, he confessed to a Capuchin 
monk. He wrote to D'Argens just before, " If I 
had a hundred thousand men, I know what I 
should do ; but as I have them not, I shall com- 
mune at Easter ! " But, writing to Rousseau, he 
thinks it shameful in Galileo to retract his opin- 
ions. Mr. Parton too, who is disposed to excuse 
some of these hypocrisies in Voltaire, is scanda- 
lized because the pastors of Geneva denied the 
charges of heresy brought against them by Vol- 
taire ; saying that " we live, as they lived, in an 
atmosphere of insincerity." In the midst of all 
this, Voltaire took credit to himself for his frank 
avowals of the truth : "I am not wrong to dare to 
utter what worthy men think. For forty years I 
have braved the base empire of the despots of the 
mind." Mr. Parton elsewhere seems to think it 
would have been impossible for Voltaire to versify 
the Psalms ; as it was " asked him to give the lie 
publicly to his whole career." But if communing 
at Easter did not do this, how could a versification 
of a few psalms accomplish it? Parton quotes 
Condorcet as saying that Voltaire could not be- 
come a hypocrite, even to be a cardinal. Could 



260 VOLTAIRE 

any one do a more hypocritical action than to par- 
take the sacraments of a Church which he despised 
in order to escape the danger of persecution ? 

When building his house at Ferney, the neigh- 
boring Catholic cures interfered with him. They 
prohibited the laborers from working for him. To 
meet this difficulty he determined to obtain the 
protection of the Pope himself. So he wrote to 
the Pope, asking for a relic to put in the church 
he had built, and received in return a piece of the 
hair-shirt of St. Francis. He went to mass fre- 
quently. Meantime, in his letters to his brother 
freethinkers, he added his usual postscript, " Ecra- 
sez l'lnfame ; " begging their aid in crushing 
Catholicism and Christianity. Yet it does not 
seem that he considered himself a hypocrite in 
thus conforming outwardly to a religion which he 
hated. He thinks that others who do so are hypo- 
crites, but not that he is one. In 1764 he writes 
to Madame du Deffand, " The worst is that we 
are surrounded by hypocrites, who worry us to 
make us think what they themselves do not think 
at all." So singular are the self-deceptions of the 
human mind. He writes to Frederic ridiculing 
the sacrament of extreme unction, and then sol- 
emnly partakes of the eucharist. Certainly he 
did not belong to the noble army of martyrs. He 
expected to overturn a great religious system, not 
by the power of faith, but by ingenious pamphlets, 
brilliant sarcasms, adroit deceptions. In thus 
thinking he was eminently superficial. 



VOLTAIRE 261 

His theory on this subject is given in an article 
in the " Dictionnaire Philosophique," quoted by 
Mr. Parton : " Distinguish honest people who think, 
from the populace who were not made to think. 
If usage obliges you to perform a ridiculous cere- 
mony for the sake of the canaille, and on the road 
you meet some people of understanding, notify 
them by a sign of the head, or a look, that you 
think as they do. . . . If imbeciles still wish to 
eat acorns, let them have acorns." 

Mr. Parton describes in full (vol. ii. p. 410) 
the ceremony of the eucharist of which Voltaire 
partook in his own church at Ferney. It was 
Easter Sunday, and Voltaire mounted the pulpit 
and preached a sermon against theft. Hearing of 
this, the bishop was scandalized, and forbade all 
the curates of the diocese from confessing, absolv- 
ing, or giving the sacrament to Voltaire. Upon 
this Voltaire writes and signs a formal demand on 
the curate of Ferney to allow him to confess and 
commune in the Catholic Church, in which he was 
born, has lived, and wishes to die ; offering to 
make all necessary declarations, all requisite pro- 
testations, in public or private, submitting himself 
absolutely to all the rules of the Church, for the 
edification of Catholics and Protestants. All this 
was a mere piece of mystification and fun. He 
pretended to be too sick to go to the church, and 
made a Capuchin come and administer the eucha- 
rist to him in bed ; Voltaire saying, " Having my 



262 VOLTAIRE 

God in my mouth, I declare that I forgive all my 
enemies." No wonder that with all his marvelous 
ability and his long war upon the Catholic Church 
he was unable to make any lasting impression upon 
it. Talent is not enough to make revolutions of 
opinion. No serious faith was ever destroyed by 
a jest. 

If we return to Rousseau, and compare his in- 
fluence with that of Voltaire, we shall find that it 
went far deeper. Voltaire was a man of immense 
talent. Talent originates nothing, but formulates 
into masterly expression what has come to it from 
the age in which it lives. Not a new idea can be 
found, we believe, in all Voltaire's innumerable 
writings. But genius has a vision of ideal truth. 
It is a prophet of the future. Rousseau, with his 
many faults, weaknesses, follies, was a man of gen- 
ius. He was probably the most eloquent writer of 
French prose who has ever appeared. He was a 
man possessed by his ideas. He had none of the 
adroitness, wit, ingenuity, of Voltaire. Instead 
of amassing an enormous fortune, he supported 
himself by copying music. Instead of being sur- 
rounded by admirers and flatterers, he led a soli- 
tary life, alone with his ideas. Instead of deny- 
ing the authorship of his works, and so giving an 
excuse to the authorities to leave him quiet, he put 
his name to his writings. He worked for his 
bread with his hands, and in his "Emile" he recom- 
mended that all boys should be taught some man- 



VOLTAIRE 263 

ual craft. Voltaire ridiculed the gentleman car- 
penter of Eousseau ; but before that generation 
passed away, many a French nobleman had rea- 
son to lament that he had not been taught to use 
the saw and the plane. 

If Voltaire belonged to the eighteenth century, 
and brought to a brilliant focus its scattered 
rays, Eousseau belonged more to the nineteenth. 
Amidst the persiflage, the mockery, the light and 
easy philosophy, of his day, he stood, " among 
them, but not of them, in a crowd of thoughts 
which were not their thoughts." This is the true 
explanation of his weakness and strength, and of 
the intense dislike felt for him by Voltaire and 
the school of Voltaire. They belonged to their 
time, Eousseau to a coming time. 

The eighteenth century, especially in France, 
was one in which nature was at its minimum and 
art at its maximum. All was art. But art sepa- 
rated from nature becomes artificial, not to say 
artful. Decorum was the law in morals ; the 
bienseances and convenances ruled in society. 
The stage was bound by conventional rules. Poe- 
try walked in silk attire, and made its toilette 
with the elaborate dignity of the levee of the 
Grand Monarque. Against all this Eousseau led 
the reaction — the reaction inevitable as destiny. 
As art had been pushed to an extreme, so now 
naturalism was carried to the opposite extreme. 
Eousseau was the apostle of nature in all things. 



264 VOLTAIBE 

Children were to be educated by the methods of 
nature, not according to the routine of old custom. 
Governments were to go back to their origin in 
human nature ; society was to be reorganized on 
first principles. This voice crying in the wilder- 
ness was like the trumpet of doom to the age, an- 
nouncing the age to come. It laid the axe at the 
root of the tree. Its outcome was the French 
Revolution, that rushing, mighty flood, which car- 
ried away the throne, the aristocracy, the manners, 
laws, and prejudices of the past. 

In his first great work, the work which startled 
Europe, Rousseau recalled man to himself. He 
said, " The true philosophy is to commune with 
one's self, " — the greatest saying, thinks Henri 
Martin, that had been pronounced in that century. 
Rousseau condemned luxury, and uttered a pro- 
phetic cry of woe over the tangled perplexities of 
the time. " There is no longer a remedy, unless 
through some great revolution, almost as much to 
he feared as the evil it would cure, — which it is 
blamable to desire, impossible to foresee ." 

" Man is naturally good," says Rousseau. Be- 
fore the frightful words " mine " and " thine " 
were invented, how could there have been, he 
asks, any vices or crimes ? He denounced all 
slavery, all inequality, all forms of oppression. 
His writings were full of exaggeration, but, says 
the French historian, " no sooner had he opened 
his lips than he restored earnestness to the world." 



VOLTAIRE 265 

The same writer, after speaking of the faults of 
the "Nouvelle Heloi'se," adds that nevertheless " a 
multitude of the letters of his ' Julie ' are master- 
pieces of eloquence, passion, and profundity ; and 
the last portions are signalized by a moral pur- 
ity, a wisdom of views, and a religious elevation 
altogether new in the France of the eighteenth cen- 
tury." Concerning " Emile," he says, " It is the pro- 
f oundest study of human nature in our language ; 
it was an ark of safety, launched by Providence 
on the waves of skepticism and materialism. If 
Eousseau had been stricken out of the eighteenth 
century, whither, we seriously ask, would the hu- 
man mind have drifted ? " 1 

The "Social Contract" appeared in 1762. In 
this work Eousseau swept away by his powerful 
eloquence the arguments which placed sovereignty 
elsewhere than in the hands of the people. This 
fundamental idea was the seed corn which broke 
from the earth in the first Revolution, and bears its 
ripe fruit in republican France to-day. D'Alem- 
bert, who disliked Eousseau, said of " Emile " 
that " it placed him at the head of all writers." 
The " Social Contract," illogical and unsound in 
many things, yet tore down the whole framework 
of despotism. Van Laun, a more recent histo- 
rian, tells us that Eousseau was a man of the 
people, who knew all their wants ; that every vice 
he attacked was one that they saw really present 
1 Martin's History of France. 



266 VOLTAIRE 

in their midst ; that he " opened the flood-gates of 
suppressed desires, which gushed forth, over- 
whelming a whole artificial world." Villemain 
writes that the words of Rousseau, " descending 
like a flame of fire, moved the souls of his con- 
temporaries ; " and that " his books glow with an 
eloquence which can never pass away." Morley, 
to whom Rousseau is essentially antipathic, says of 
the " Social Contract " that its first words, " Man 
is born free, but is everywhere in chains, " thrilled 
two continents, — that it was the gospel of the 
Jacobins ; and the action of the convention in 
1794 can be explained only by the influence of 
Rousseau. He taught France to believe in a gov- 
ernment of the people, by the people, and for the 
people. Locke had already taught this doctrine 
in England, where it produced no such violent 
outbreak, because it encountered no such glaring 
abuses. 

Such is the striking contrast between these two 
greatest writers in modern French literature. It 
is singular to observe their instinctive antagonism 
in every point of belief and character. The merits 
of one are precisely opposite to those of the other : 
their faults are equally opposed. 

The events of Voltaire's life have been so often 
told that Mr. Parton has not been able to acid 
much to our knowledge of his biography. He was 
born in 1694 and died in 1778, at the age of 
eighty-four, though at his birth he was so feeble 



VOLTAIRE 267 

that those who believe that the world's progress 
depends on the survival of the fittest would have 
thought him not fit to be brought up. This was 
also the case with Goethe and Walter Scott. His 
father was a notary, and the name Arouet had 
that of Voltaire added to it, it being a name in his 
mother's family. This affix was adopted by the 
lad when in the Bastille, at the age of twenty-four. 
As a duck takes to water, so Voltaire took to his 
pen. In his twelfth year he wrote verses ad- 
dressed to the Dauphin, which so pleased the 
famous Ninon de l'Enclos, then in her ninetieth 
year, that she left the boy a legacy of two thou- 
sand francs. He went to a Jesuits' school, and 
always retained a certain liking for the Jesuits. 
His father wished to make him a notary, but he 
would " pen a stanza when he should engross ; " 
and the usual struggles between the paternal pur- 
pose and the filial instinct ended, as usual, in the 
triumph of the latter. He led a wild career for a 
time, in the society of dissipated abbes, debauched 
noblemen, and women to whom pleasure was the 
only object. Suspected of having written a lam- 
poon on the death of Louis XIV., he was sent to 
the Bastille, and came forth not only with a new 
name, but with literature as his aim for the rest of 
his life. His first play appeared on the stage in 
1718, and from that time he continued to write 
till his death. He traveled from the chateau of 
one nobleman to another, pouring out his satires 



268 VOLTAIRE 

and sarcasms through the press ; threatened by 
the angry rulers and priests who governed France, 
but always escaping by some adroit manoeuvre. 
In England he became a deist and a mathemati- 
cian. His views of Christ and Christianity were 
summed up in a quatrain which may be thus 
translated. Speaking of Jesus, he says, — 

" His actions are holy, his ethics divine ; 
Into hearts which are wounded he pours oil and wine. 
And if, through imposture, those truths are received, 
It still is a blessing to be thus deceived." 

He lived many years at Cirey with the Marchion- 
ess of Chatelet ; the marquis, her husband, accept- 
ing the curious relation without any objection. 
Then followed the still stranger episode of his 
residence with Frederic the Great, their love quar- 
rels and reconciliations. After this friendship 
came to ^n end, Voltaire went to live near Geneva 
in Switzerland, but soon bought another estate 
just out of Switzerland, in France, and a third a 
short distance away, in the territory of another 
power. Thus, if threatened in one state, he could 
easily pass into another. Here he lived and 
worked till the close of his life, an untiring writer. 
He was a man of infinite wit, kind-hearted, w r ith 
little malignity of any sort, wishing in the main 
to do good. His violent attacks upon Christianity 
may be explained by the fact of the corruptions of 
the Church which were around him. The. Church 
of France in that day, in its higher circles, was a 



VOLTAIRE 269 

persecuting Church, yet without faith : greedy for 
wealth, living in luxury, careless of the poor, and 
well deserving the attacks of Voltaire. That he 
could not look deeper and see the need of reli- 
gious institutions of a better sort was his mis- 
fortune. 

This work is a storehouse of facts for the history 
of Voltaire and his time. We do not think it will 
materially alter the judgment pronounced on him 
by such critics as Carlyle, Morley, and the majority 
of French writers in our day. Voltaire was a shin- 
ing light in his age, but that age has gone by, and 
can never return. 



EALPH WALDO EMEESON 1 

Matt. vi. 23. — If thine eye he single, thy whole body shall be full of 

light. 

It is natural and fit that many pulpits to-day 
should take for their theme the character and influ- 
ence of the great thinker and poet who has just 
left us ; for every such soul is a new revelation of 
God's truth and love. Each opens the gateway be- 
tween our lower world of earthly care and earthly 
pleasure into a higher heavenly world of spirit. 
Such men lift our lives to a higher plane, and con- 
vince us that we, also, belong to God, to eternity, 
to heaven. And few, in our day, have been such 
mediators of heavenly things to mankind as Ralph 
Waldo Emerson. 

Last Sunday afternoon, when the town of Con- 
cord was mourning through all its streets for the 
loss of its beloved and revered citizen ; when the 
humblest cottage had on its door the badge of sor- 
row ; when great numbers came from abroad to 
testify their affection and respect, that which im- 
pressed me the most was the inevitable response 
of the human heart to whatever is true and good. 
Cynics may tell us that men are duped by charla- 

1 A sermon preached May 7, 1882. 



RALPH WALDO EMERSON 271 

tans, led by selfish demagogues, incapable of know- 
ing honor and truth when set before them ; that 
they always stone their prophets and crucify their 
saviors ; that they have eyes, and do not see ; ears, 
and never hear. This is all true for a time ; but 
inevitably, by a law as sure as that which governs 
the movements of the planets, the souls of men 
turn at last toward what is true, generous, and 
noble. The prophets and teachers of the race may 
be stoned by one generation, but their monuments 
are raised by the next. They are misunderstood 
and misrepresented to-day, but to-morrow they be- 
come the accredited leaders of their time. Jesus, 
who knew well that he would be rejected and mur- 
dered by a people blind and deaf to his truth, also 
knew that this truth would sooner or later break 
down all opposition, and make him master and 
king of the world. " I, if I be lifted up, will draw 
all men unto me." 

Last Sunday afternoon, as the grateful proces- 
sion followed their teacher to his grave in the Con- 
cord cemetery, the harshness of our spring seemed 
to relent, and Nature became tender toward him 
who had loved her so well. I thought of his words, 
" The visible heavens and earth sympathized with 
Jesus." The town where " the embattled farmers 
stood ; " where the musket was discharged which 
opened the War of the Revolution — the gun of 
which Lafayette said, " It was the alarm-gun of the 
world ; " the town of Hawthorne's " Old Manse," 



272 BALPH WALDO EMERSON 

and of his grave, now that Emerson also sleeps in 
its quiet valley, has received an added glory. It 
has become one of the "Meccas of the mind." 

Let me describe the mental and spiritual condi- 
tion of New England when Emerson appeared. 
Calvinism, with its rigorous dogmatism, was slowly 
dying, and had been succeeded by a calm and some- 
what formal rationalism. Locke was still the mas- 
ter in the realm of thought; Addison and Blair in 
literary expression. In poetry, the school of Pope 
was engaged in conflict with that of Byron and his 
contemporaries. Wordsworth had led the way to 
a deeper view of nature ; but Wordsworth could 
scarcely be called a popular writer. In theology a 
certain literalism prevailed, and the doctrines of 
Christianity were inferred from counting and weigh- 
ing texts on either side. Not the higher reason, 
with its intuition of eternal ideas, but the analytic 
understanding, with its logical methods, was con- 
sidered to be the ruler in the world of thought. 
There was more of culture than of intellectual life, 
more of good habits than of moral enthusiasm. 
Religion had become very much of an external 
institution. Christianity consisted in holding ra- 
tional or orthodox opinions, going regularly to 
church, and listening every Sunday to a certain 
number of prayers, hymns, and sermons. These 
sermons, with some striking exceptions, were rather 
tame and mechanical. In Boston, it is true, Buck- 
minster had appeared, — that soul of flame which 



RALPH WALDO EMERSON 273 

soon wore to decay its weak body. The consum- 
mate orator Edward Everett had followed him in 
Brattle Square pulpit. Above all, Channing had 
looked, with a new spiritual insight, into the truths 
of religion and morality. But still the mechanical 
treatment prevailed in a majority of the churches 
of New England, and was considered, on the whole, 
to be the wisest and safest method. There was an 
unwritten creed of morals, literature, and social 
thought to which all were expected to conform. 
There was little originality and much repetition. 
On all subjects there were certain formulas which 
it was considered proper to repeat. " Thou art a 
blessed fellow," says one of Shakspeare's charac- 
ters, " to think as other people think. Not a man's 
thought in the world keeps the roadway better than 
thine." The thought of New England kept the 
roadway. Of course, at all times a large part of 
the belief of the community is derived from mem- 
ory, custom, and imitation ; but in those days, if 
I remember them aright, it was regarded as a kind 
of duty to think as every one else thought ; a sort 
of delinquency, or weakness, to differ from the ma- 
jority. 

If the movements of thought are now much 
more independent and spontaneous ; if to-day tra- 
ditions have lost their despotic power; if even 
those who hold an orthodox creed are able to treat 
it as a dead letter, respectable for its past uses, 
but by no means binding on us now, this is largely 



274 BALPH WALDO EMERSON 

owing to the manly position taken by Emerson. 
And yet, let it be observed, this influence was not 
exercised by attacking old opinions, by argument, 
by denial, by criticism. Theodore Parker did all 
this, but his influence on thought has been far less 
than that of Emerson. Parker was a hero who 
snuffed the battle afar off, and flung himself, 
sword in hand, into the thick of the conflict. But, 
much as we love and reverence his honesty, his 
immense activity, his devotion to truth and right, 
we must admit to-day, standing by these two 
friendly graves, that the power of Emerson to 
soften the rigidity of time-hardened belief was far 
the greater. It is the old fable of the storm and 
sun. The violent attacks of the tempest only 
made the traveler cling more closely to his cloak ; 
the genial heat of the sun compelled him to throw 
it aside. In all Emerson's writings there is 
scarcely any argument. He attacks no man's be- 
lief; he simply states his own. His method is 
always positive, constructive. He opens the win- 
dows and lets in more light. He is no man's 
opponent ; the enemy of no one. He states what 
he sees, and that which he does not see he passes 
by. He was often attacked, but never replied. 
His answer was to go forward, and say something 
else. He did not care for what he called the 
" bugbear consistency." If to-day he said what 
seemed like Pantheism, and to-morrow he saw 
some truth which seemed to reveal a divine per- 



RALPH WALDO EMERSON 275 

sonality, a supreme will, he uttered the last, as he 
had declared the first, always faithful to the light 
within. He left it to the spirit of truth to recon- 
cile such apparent contradictions. He was like 
his ow T n humble-bee — 

" Seeing* only what is fair, 

Sipping* only what is sweet ; 
Thou dost mock at fate and care, 

Leave the chaff and take the wheat." 

By this method of positive statement he not 
only saved the time usually wasted in argument, 
attack, reply, rejoinder, but he gave us the sub- 
stance of Truth, instead of its form. Logic and 
metaphysic reveal no truths ; they merely arrange 
in order what the higher faculties of the mind 
have made known. Hence the speedy oblivion 
which descends on polemics of all sorts. The 
great theological debaters, where are they ? The 
books of Horsley and McGee are buried in 
the same grave with those of Belsham and 
Priestley, their old opponents. The bitter attacks 
on Christianity by Voltaire and Paine are inurned 
in the same dark and forgotten vaults with the 
equally bitter defenses of Christianity by its 
nnmerous champions. Argument may often be 
necessary, but no truth is slain by argument ; no 
error can be kept alive by it. Emerson is an emi- 
nent example of a man who never replied to at- 
tacks, but went on his way, and saw at last all 
opposition hushed, all hostility at an end. He 



276 RALPH WALDO EMERSON 

devoted his powers to giving to his readers his 
insights, knowing that these alone feed the soul. 
Thus men came to him to be fed. His sheep 
heard his voice. Those who felt themselves better 
for his instruction followed him. He collected 
around him thus an ever-increasing band of disci- 
ples, until in England, in Germany, in all lands 
where men read and think, he is looked up to as a 
master. Many of these disciples were persons of 
rare gifts and powers, like Margaret Fuller, Theo- 
dore Parker, George Ripley, Hawthorne. Many 
others were unknown to fame, yet deeply sensible 
of the blessings they had received from their pro- 
phet and seer of the nineteenth century. For this 
was his office. He was a man who saw. He had 
the vision and the faculty divine. He sat near 
the fountain-head, and tasted the waters of Heli- 
con in their source. 

His first little book, a duodecimo of less than a 
hundred pages, called "Nature," published in 
1836, indicates all these qualities. It begins 
thus : — 

" Our age is retrospective. It builds the sepul- 
chres of the fathers. It writes biographies, his- 
tories, criticisms. The foregoing generations be- 
held God and Nature face to face; we, through 
their eyes. Why should not we also enjoy an 
original relation to the universe? Why should 
not we have a poetry and philosophy of insight, 
and not of tradition, and a religion by revelation 



RALPH WALDO EMERSON 277 

to us, and not the history of theirs ? . . . The sun 
shines to-day also. . . . Undoubtedly we have no 
questions to ask which are unanswerable." 

This was his first doctrine, that of self-reliance. 
He taught that God had given to every man the 
power to see with his own eyes, think with his own 
mind, believe what seemed to him true, plant him- 
self on his instincts, and, as he says, " call a pop- 
gun a pop-gun, though the ancient and honorable 
of the earth declare it to be the crack of doom." 
This was manly and wholesome doctrine. It 
might, no doubt, be abused, and lead some persons 
to think they were men of original genius when 
they were only eccentric. It may have led others 
to attack all institutions and traditions, as though, 
if a thing were old, it was necessarily false. But 
Emerson himself was the best antidote to such 
extravagance. To a youth who brought to him a 
manuscript confuting Plato he replied, " When 
you attack the king you ought to be sure to kill 
him." But his protest against the prevailing con- 
ventionalism was healthy, and his call on all " to 
be themselves " was inspiring. 

The same doctrine is taught in the introductory 
remarks of the editors of the " Dial." They say 
they have obeyed with joy the strong current of 
thought which has led many sincere persons to 
reprobate that rigor of conventions which is turn- 
ing them to stone, which renounces hope and only 
looks backward, which suspects improvement, and 



278 BALPH WALDO EMERSON 

holds nothing so much in horror as the dreams of 
youth. This work, the " Dial," made a great 
impression, out of all proportion to its small cir- 
culation. By the elders it was cordially declared 
to be unintelligible mysticism, and so, no doubt, 
much of it was. Those inside, its own friends, 
often made as much fun of it as those outside. 
Yet it opened the door for many new and noble 
thoughts, and was a wild bugle-note, a reveille, 
calling on all generous hearts to look toward the 
coming day. 

Here is an extract from one of Emerson's letters 
from Europe as early as March, 1833. It is dated 
Naples : — 

" And what if it be Naples ! It is only the 
same world of cakes and ale, of man, and truth, 
and folly. I will not be imposed upon by a name. 
It is so easy to be overawed by names that it is 
hard to keep one's judgment upright, and be 
pleased only after your own way. Baiae and Pau- 
silippo sound so big that we are ready to surren- 
der at discretion, and not stickle for our private 
opinion against what seems the human race. But 
here 's for the plain old Adam, the simple, genu- 
ine self against the whole world." 

Again he says : " Nothing so fatal to genius as 
genius. Mr. Taylor, author of ' Van Artevelde,' 
is a man of great intellect, but by study of Shake- 
speare is forced to reproduce Shakespeare." 

Thus the first great lesson taught by Mr. Emer- 



BALPH WALDO EMERSON 279 

son was " self-reliance." And the second was 
like it, though apparently opposed to it, " God- 
reliance." Not really opposed to it, for it meant 
this : God is near to your mind and heart, as 
he was to the mind and heart of the prophets 
and inspired men of the past. God is ready to 
inspire you also if you will trust in him. In the 
little book called " Nature " he says : — 

u The highest is present to the soul of man ; the 
dread universal essence, which is not wisdom, or 
love, or power, or beauty, but all in one, and each 
entirely, is that for which all things exist, and by 
which they are. Believe that throughout nature 
spirit is present ; that it is one, that it does no.t 
act upon us from without, but through ourselves. 
• . • As a plant on the earth, so man rests on the 
bosom of God, nourished by unfailing fountains, 
and drawing at his need inexhaustible power." 

And so in his poem called "The Problem" he 
teaches that all religions are from God; that all 
the prophets and sibyls and lofty souls that have 
sung psalms, written scripture, and built the tem- 
ples and cathedrals of men, were inspired by a 
spirit above their own. He puts aside the shallow 
explanation that any of the great religions ever 
came from priestcraft : — 

" Out from the heart of Nature rolled 
The burdens of the Bible old ; 
The litanies of nations came, 
Like the volcano's tongue of flame, 
Up from the burning core below, 
The canticles of love and woe. 



280 BALPH WALDO EMERSON 

" The word unto the prophet spoken 
Was writ on tables yet unbroken ; 
The word by seers or sibyls told, 
In groves of oak or fanes of gold, 
Still floats upon the moving wind, 
Still whispers to the willing mind. 
One accent of the Holy Ghost 
The heedless world hath never lost." 

In all that Emerson says of nature he is equally 
devout. He sees God in it all. It is to him full 
of a divine charm. " In the woods," he says, " is 
perpetual youth. Within these plantations of God 
a decorum and sanctity reigns, and we return to 
reason and faith." " The currents of the Univer- 
sal Being circulate through me. I am part and 
particle of God." For saying such things as these 
he was accused of Pantheism. And he was a Pan- 
theist ; yet only as Paul was a Pantheist when he 
said, " In Him we live and move and have our 
being ; " " From whom and through whom are all 
things ; " " The fullness of him who filleth all in 
all." Emerson was, in his view of nature, at one 
with Wordsworth, who said : — 

" The clouds were touched, 
And in their silent faces he could read 
Unutterable love. Sensation, soul, and form 
All melted into him ; they swallowed up 
His animal being ; in them did he live, 
And by them did he live ; they were his life. 

In such high hour 
Of visitation from the living God, 
Thought was not ; in enjoyment it expired." 

Emerson has thus been to our day the prophet 



RALPH WALDO EMERSON 281 

of God in the soul, in nature, in life. He has 
stood for spirit against matter. Darwin, his great 
peer, the serene master in the school of science, 
was like him in this, — that he also said what he 
saw and no more. He also taught what God 
showed to him in the outward world of sense, as 
Emerson what God showed in the inward world of 
spirit. Amid the stormy disputes of their time, 
each of these men went his own way, his eye sin- 
gle and his whole body full of light. The work of 
Darwin was the easier, for he floated with the 
current of the time, which sets at present so strongly 
toward the study of things seen and temporal. 
But the work of Emerson was more noble, for he 
stands for things unseen and eternal, — for a larger 
religion, a higher faith, a nobler worship. This 
strong and tender soul has done its work and gone 
on its way. But he will always fill a niche of the 
universal Church as a New England prophet. He 
had the purity of the New England air in his moral 
nature, a touch of the shrewd Yankee wit in his 
speech, and the long inheritance of ancestral faith 
incarnate and consolidated in blood and brain. 
But to this were added qualities which were de- 
rived from some far-off realm of human life: an 
Oriental cast of thought, a touch of mediaeval 
mysticism, and a vocabulary brought from books 
unknown to our New England literature. No 
commonplaces of language are to be found in his 
writings, and though he read the older writers, he 



282 RALPH WALDO EMERSON 

does not imitate them. He, also, like his humble- 
bee, has gathered contributions from remotest fields, 
and enriched our language with a new and pictu- 
resque speech all his own. 

Let us, then, be grateful for this best of God's 
gifts, — another soul sent to us filled with divine 
light. Thus we learn anew how full are nature 
and life of God : — 

" Ever fresh the broad creation, 
A divine improvisation ; 
From the heart of God proceeds 
A single will, a million deeds." 

One word concerning Mr. Emerson's relation to 
Christ and to Christianity. The distinction which 
he made between Jesus and other teachers was, no 
doubt, one of degree and not one of kind. He put 
no great gulf of supernatural powers, origin, or of- 
fice between Christ and the ethnic prophets. But 
his reverence for Jesus was profound and tender. 
Nor did he object to the word " Christian " or to 
the Christian Church. In recent years, at least, he 
not unfrequently attended the services of the Uni- 
tarian Church in his town, and I have met him at 
Unitarian conventions, a benign and revered pre- 
sence. 

In the cemetery at Bonn, on the Rhine, is the 
tomb of Niebuhr, the historian, a man of some- 
what like type, as I judge, to our Emerson. At 
least, some texts on his monument would be admi- 
rably appropriate for any stone which may be 



BALPH WALDO EMERSON 283 

placed over the remains of the American prophet 
and poet in the sweet valley of tombs in Concord. 
One of these texts was from Sirach xlvii. 14, 17 : 

" How wise wast thou in thy youth, and as a flood filled with 
understanding* ! 

Thy soul covered the whole earth, and thou filledst it with 
dark parables. 

Thy name went far unto the islands, and for thy peace thou 
wast beloved. 

The countries marvelled at thee for thy songs and proverbs 
and parables and interpretations." 

And equally appropriate would be this Horatian 
line, also on Niebuhr's monument : — 

M Quis desiderio sit pudor aut modus tarn cari capitis." 

From a lifelong friend of Emerson I have just 
received a letter containing these words, which, 
better than most descriptions, give the character of 
his soul : — 

" And so the white wings have spread, and the 
great soul has left us. 

* 'Tis death is dead ; not he.' 

He had no vanity, no selfishness ; no greed, no 
hate ; none of the weights that drag on common 
mortals. His life was an illumination ; a large, 
fair light ; the Pharos of New England, as in other 
days our dear brother called him. And this light 
shone further and wider the longer it burned." 



HARRIET MARTINEAU 1 

The whole work 2 is very interesting. How could 
it be otherwise, in giving the history of so remark- 
able a life ? The amount of literary work which 
Miss Martineau performed is amazing. She began 
to write for the press when she was nineteen, and 
continued until she could no longer hold her pen. 
The pen was her sword, which she wielded with a 
warrior's joy, in the conflict of truth with error, of 
right with wrong. She wrote many books ; but 
her articles in reviews and newspapers were innu- 
merable. We find no attempt in either part of this 
biography to give a complete list of her writings. 
Perhaps it would be impossible. She never seems 
to have thought of keeping such a record herself, 
any more than a hero records the number of the 
blows he strikes in battle. No sooner had she dis- 
missed one task than another came ; and sometimes 
several were going on together. Like other volu- 
minous writers, she enjoyed the exercise of her pro- 
ductive powers ; and, as she somewhere tells us, her 
happiest hours were those in which she was seated 
at her desk with her pen. 

1 The North American Review, May, 1877. 

2 Harriet Martineau 's Autobiography. Edited by Maria Weston 
Chapman. 2 vols. 



HARRIET MARTIN E ATI 285 

Her principal works cover a large range of 
thought and study. One of her first books, " The 
Traditions of Palestine," she continued to regard 
long after with more affection than any other of 
her writings, except " Eastern Life." But her 
authorship began when she was nineteen, in an arti- 
cle contributed to a Unitarian monthly. After- 
wards she obtained three separate prizes offered by 
the Central Unitarian Association for three essays 
on different topics. About the same time she wrote 
"Five Years of Youth," a tale which she never 
looked at afterward. But her first great step in 
authorship, and that which at once made her a 
power in politics and in literature, was taken when 
she commenced her series of tales on " Political 
Economy." She began, however, to write these 
stories, not knowing that she was treating questions 
of Political Economy, " the very name of which," 
she says, " was then either unknown to me, or con- 
veyed no meaning." She was then about twenty- 
five years old. She had the usual difficulties with 
various publishers which unknown authors are sure 
to experience, and these tales, which became so 
popular, were rejected by one firm after another. 
Oue of them was refused by the Society for the 
Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, as being too dull. 
The president of that Society, Lord Brougham, 
afterward vented his rage on the sub-committee 
which rejected the offered story, and so had per- 
mitted their Society, " instituted for that very pur- 



286 HARRIET MARTIN EAU 

pose, to be driven out of the field by a little deaf 
woman at Norwich." At last a publisher was 
found who agreed to take the books on very un- 
satisfactory terms. As soon as the first number 
appeared, the success of the series was established. 
A second edition of five thousand copies was im- 
mediately called for, — the entire periodical press 
came out in favor of the tales, — and from that 
hour Miss Martineau had only to choose what to 
write, sure that it would at once find a publisher. 

She was at this time thirty years old. She was 
already deaf, her health poor ; but she then began 
a career of intellectual labor seldom equaled by 
the strongest man through the longest life. She 
began to write every morning after breakfast ; and, 
unless when traveling, seldom passed a morning 
during the rest of her life without writing, — 
working from eight o'clock until two. Her method 
was, after selecting her subject, to procure all the 
standard works upon it, and study them. She then 
proceeded to make the plan of her work, and to 
draw the outline of her story. If the scene was 
laid abroad, she procured books of travels and 
topography. Then she drew up the contents of 
each chapter in detail, and, after this preliminary 
labor, the story was written easily and with joy. 

Of these stories she wrote thirty-four in two 
years and a half. She was then thirty -two. She 
received £2,000 for the whole series, — a suffi- 
ciently small compensation, — but she established 



HARRIET MARTINEAU 287 

her position and her fame. Her principal books pub- 
lished afterward were her two works on America, 
the novels " Deerbrook " and " The Hour and the 
Man ; " nine volumes of tales on the Forest and 
Game Laws ; four stories in the " Playfellow ; " 
" Life in the Sick-Room ; " " Letters on Mesmer- 
ism ; " " Eastern Life, Past and Present ; " " His- 
tory of England during the Thirty Years' Peace ; " 
" Letters on the Laws of Man's Social Nature and 
Development ; " " Translation and Condensation 
of Comte's Positive Philosophy ; " besides many 
smaller works, making fifty-two titles in Allibone. 
In addition to this, she wrote many articles in re- 
views and magazines ; and Mrs. Chapman mentions 
that she sent to a single London journal, the 
" Daily News," sixteen hundred articles, at the rate 
sometimes of six a week. Surely Harriet Marti- 
neau was one who worked faithfully while her day 
endured. 

But, if we would do her justice, we must con- 
sider also the motive and spirit in which she 
worked. Each thing she did had for its purpose 
nothing merely personal, but some good to man- 
kind. Though there was nothing in her character 
of the sentimentalism of philanthropy, she was 
filled with the spirit of philanthropy. A born re- 
former, she inherited from her Huguenot and her 
Unitarian ancestors the love of truth and the hatred 
of error, with the courage which was ready to avow 
her opinions, however unpopular. Thus, her work 



288 HARRIET MARTINEAU 

was warfare, and every article or book which she 
printed was a blow delivered against some flagrant 
wrong, or what she believed such, — in defense of 
some struggling truth, or something supposed to be 
truth. She might be mistaken ; but her purposes 
through life were, in the main, noble, generous, and 
good. 

And there can be no question of her ability, 
moral and intellectual. No commonplace mind 
could have overcome such obstacles and achieved 
such results. Apparently she had no very high 
opinion of her own intellectual powers. She denies 
that she possesses genius ; but she asserts her own 
power. She criticises " Deerbrook " with some 
severity. And, in fact, Harriet Martineau's mind 
is analytic rather than creative ; it is strong rather 
than subtle ; and, if it possesses imagination, it is 
of rather a prosaic kind. Her intellect is of a 
curiously masculine order ; no other female writer 
was ever less feminine. With all her broad hu- 
manity she has little sympathy for individuals. A 
large majority of those whom she mentions in her 
memoirs she treats with a certain contempt. 

Her early life seems to have been very sad. We 
are again and again told how she was misunder- 
stood and maltreated in her own home. Her health 
was bad until she was thirty ; partly owing, as she 
supposed, to ill-treatment. She needed affection, 
and was treated with sternness. Justice she did 
not receive, nor kindness, and her heart was soured 



HARRIET MARTIN EAU 289 

and her temper spoiled, so she tells us, by this mis- 
management. As she does not specify, or give us 
the details of this ill-treatment, the story is useless 
as a warning ; and we hardly see the reason for 
thus publishing the wrongs of her childhood. As 
children may be sometimes unjust to parents, no 
less than parents to children, the facts and the 
moral are both left uncertain. And, on the whole, 
her chief reason for telling the story appears to be 
the mental necessity she was under of judging and 
sentencing those from whom she supposes herself 
to have received ill-treatment in any part of her 
life. 

This is indeed the most painful feature of the 
work before us. Knowing the essentially generous 
and just spirit of Harriet Martineau, it is strange 
to see how carefully she has loaded this piece of 
artillery with explosive and lacerating missiles, 
to be discharged after her death among those with 
whom she had mingled in social intercourse or lit- 
erary labors. Some against whom she launches 
her sarcasms are still living ; some are dead, but 
have left friends behind, to be wounded by her 
caustic judgments. Is it that her deficiency in a 
woman's sensibility, or the absence of a poetic 
imagination, prevented her from realizing the suf- 
fering she would inflict ? Or is it the habit of mind 
from which those are apt to suffer who devote them- 
selves to the reform of abuses ? As each kind of 
manual occupation exposes the workman to some 



290 HARRIET MARTINEAU 

special disease, — as those who dig canals suffer 
from malaria, and file-grinders from maladies of 
the lungs, — so it seems that each moral occupation 
has its appropriate moral danger. Clergymen are 
apt to be dogmatic or sectarian ; lawyers become 
sharp and sophistical ; musicians and artists are 
irritable ; and the danger of a reformer is of be- 
coming a censorious critic of those who cannot ac- 
cept his methods, or who will not join his party. 
That Harriet Martineau did not escape this risk 
will presently appear. 

While writing her politico-economical stories she 
moved to London, and there exchanged the quiet 
seclusion of her Norwich life for social triumphs of 
the first order, and intercourse with every kind of 
celebrity. All had read her books, from Victoria, 
who was then a little girl perusing them with her 
governess, to foreign kings and savants of the high- 
est distinction. So this young author — for she was 
only thirty — was received at once into the most 
brilliant circles of London society. But it does not 
appear that she lost a single particle of her dignity 
or self-possession. Among the great she neither 
asserted herself too much nor showed too much de- 
ference. Vanity was not her foible ; and her head 
was too solidly set upon her shoulders to be turned 
by such successes. She enjoyed the society of these 
people of superior refinement, rank, and culture, 
but did not come to depend upon it ; and in all this 
Harriet Martineau sinned not in her spirit. 



HARRIET MARTINEAU 291 

But why, in writing about these people long 
afterward, should she have thought it necessary to 
produce such sharp and absolute sentences on each 
and all ? Into this judgment-hall of Osiris-Marti- 
neau, every one whom she has ever known is called 
up to receive his final doom. The poor Unitarian 
ministers, who had taught the child as they best 
could, are dismissed with contemptuous severity. 
This religious instruction had certainly done her 
some good. Religion, she admits, was her best 
resource till she wrought her way to something 
better. Ann Turner, daughter of the Unitarian 
minister, gave her piety a practical turn, and when 
afraid of every one she saw, she was not at all 
afraid of God ; and, on the whole, she says religion 
was a great comfort and pleasure to her. Never- 
theless, she is astonished that Unitarians should 
believe that they are giving their children a Chris- 
tian education. She accuses these teachers of her 
childhood of altering the Scripture to suit their 
own notions ; being apparently ignorant that most 
of the interpolations or mistranslations of which 
they complained have since been conceded as such 
by the best Orthodox critics. But she does not 
hesitate to give her opinion of all her old acquaint- 
ances in the frankest manner, and for the most 
part it is unfavorable. Mrs. Opie and Mrs. John 
Taylor are among the " mere pedants." William 
Taylor, from want of truth and conviction, talked 
blasphemy. She speaks with contempt of a physi- 



292 HARRIET MARTINEAU 

cian who politely urged her to come and dine with 
him, because he had neglected her until she became 
famous. Lord Brougham was "vain and selfish, 
low in morals, and unrestrained in temper." Lord 
Campbell was " flattering to an insulting degree ; " 
Archbishop Whately, " odd and overbearing," 
" sometimes rude and tiresome," and " singularly 
overrated ; " Stanley, Bishop of Norwich, " timid," 
"sensitive," "heedless," "without courage or dig- 
nity." Macaulay "talked nonsense" about the 
copyright bill, and " set at naught every principle 
of justice in regard to authors' earnings." Macau- 
lay's opposition to that bill was based on such 
grounds of perfect justice that he defeated it sin- 
gle-handed. But Harriet Martineau decided then 
and there that Macaulay was a failure, and that 
"he wanted heart," and that he "never has 
achieved any complete success." The poet Camp- 
bell had "a morbid craving for praise." As to 
women, Lady Morgan, Lady Davy, Mrs. Jameson, 
Mrs. Austin, " may make women blush and men 
be insolent " with their " gross and palpable vani- 
ties." Landseer was a toady to great people. 
Morpeth had " evident weaknesses." Sir Charles 
Bell showed his ignorance by relying on the argu- 
ment for Design. The resources of Eastlake were 
very homes. John Sterling " rudely ignored me." 
Lady Mary Shepherd was " a pedant." Coleridge, 
she asserts, will only be remembered as a warning ; 
though twenty years ago she, Miss Martineau, 



HARRIET MARTINEAU 293 

" regarded him as a poet." Godwin was " timid." 
Basil Montagu was " cowardly ; " and Lord Mon- 
teagle " agreeable enough to those who were not 
particular about sincerity." Urquhart had " in- 
sane egotism and ferocious discontent." The 
Howitts made " an unintelligible claim to my 
friendship," their " tempers are turbulent and 
unreasonable." It may be some explanation of 
this unintelligible claim that it was heard through 
her trumpet. Fredrika Bremer is accused of habits 
of " flattery " and " a want of common sense." 
Miss Mitford is praised, but then accused of a 
" habit of flattery," and blamed for her " dispar- 
agement of others." And it is Miss Martineau 
who brings this charge! She also tells us that 
Miss Bremer " proposes to reform the world by a 
floating religiosity," whatever that may be. But 
perhaps her severest sentence is pronounced on the 
Kembles, who are accused of " incurable vulgarity " 
and "unreality." In this case, as in others, Miss 
Martineau pronounces this public censure on those 
whom she had learned to know in the intimacy of 
private friendship and personal confidence. She 
thus violates the rules rather ostentatiously laid 
down in her Introduction. For she claims there 
that she practices self-denial in interdicting the 
publication of her letters, 1 and gives her reasons 

1 For some reason she afterward saw fit partially to abandon 
this self-denial, and allowed Mrs. Chapman to print any letters 
written to herself by Miss Martineau. 



294 HARRIET MARTINEAU 

thus : " Epistolary conversation is written speech ; 
and the onus rests with those who publish it to 
show why the laws of honor, which are uncontested 
in regard to conversation, may be violated when 
the conversation is written instead of spoken." 
Most of her sharp judgments above quoted are 
pronounced on those whom she learned to know 
in the private intercourse of society. Sometimes 
she recites the substance of what she heard (or 
supposed that she heard ; for she used an ear-tube 
when she first went to live in London). Thus she 
tells about a conversation with Wordsworth, and 
reports his complaints of Jeffrey and other re- 
viewers, and quotes him as saying about one of his 
own poems, that it was " a chain of very valooable 
thoughts." " You see, it does not best fulfill the 
conditions of poetry; but it is" (solemnly) "a 
chain of extremely valooable thoughts." She then 
proceeds to pronounce her sentence on Wordsworth 
as she did on Coleridge. She felt at once, she 
says, in Wordsworth's works, " the absence of 
sound, accurate, weighty thought, and of genuine 
poetic inspiration." She also informs us that " the 
very basis of philosophy is absent in him," and 
that it is only necessary " to open Shelley, Tenny- 
son, or even poor Keats ... to feel that, with all 
their truth and all their charm, few of Words- 
worth's pieces are poems." " Even poor Keats 1" 
This is her de haut en has style of criticism 
on Wordsworth, one of whose poems is generally 



HABEIET MAETINEAU 295 

accepted as the finest written in the English lan- 
guage during the last hundred years. And this is 
her way of respecting " the code of honor " in re- 
gard to private conversation ! 

In 1834, at the age of thirty-two, Harriet Marti- 
neau sailed for the United States, where she re- 
mained two years. She went for rest; but the 
quantity of work done in those two years would 
have been enough to fill five or six years of any 
common life. At this point she began a new ca- 
reer; forming new ties, engaging in new duties, 
studying new problems, and beginning a new activ- 
ity in another sphere of labor. The same great 
qualities which she had hitherto displayed showed 
themselves here again; accompanied with their 
corresponding defects. Her wonderful power of 
study enabled her to enter into the very midst of 
the phenomena of American life ; her noble gener- 
osity induced her to throw herself heart, hand, and 
mind into the greatest struggle then waging on the 
face of the earth. The anti-slavery question, which 
the great majority of people of culture despised 
or disliked, took possession of her soul. She be- 
came one of the party of Abolitionists, of which 
Mr. Garrison was the chief, and lived to see that 
party triumph in the downfall of slavery. She 
took her share of the hatred or the scorn heaped 
on that fiery body of zealous propagandists, and 
was counted worthy of belonging to what she her- 
self called " the Martyr Age of the United States." 



296 HARRIET MARTIN EAU 

Fortunately for herself, before she visited Bos- 
ton, and became acquainted with the Abolitionists, 
she went to Washington, and traveled somewhat 
extensively in the Southern States. At Washing- 
ton she saw many eminent Southern senators, who 
cordially invited her to visit them at their homes. 
In South Carolina she was welcomed or introduced 
by Mr. Calhoun, Governor Hayne, and Colonel 
Preston. Judge Porter took charge of her in 
Louisiana. In Kentucky she was the guest of 
Mrs. Irwin, Henry Clay's daughter and neighbor. 
Without fully accepting Mrs. Chapman's some- 
what sweeping assertion that there was no eminent 
statesman, man of science, politician, partisan, 
philanthropist, jurist, professor, merchant, divine, 
nor distinguished woman, in the whole land, who 
did not pay her homage, there is no doubt that she 
received the respect and good-will of many such. 
She was deeply impressed, she says, on arriving in 
the United States, with a society basking in one 
bright sunshine of good-will. She thought the New 
Englanders, perhaps, the best people in the world. 
Many well-known names appear in these pages, as 
soon becoming intimate acquaintances or friends ; 
among these were Judge Story, John G. Pal- 
frey, Stephen C. Phillips, the Gilmans of South 
Carolina, Mr. and Mrs. Furness of Philadelphia, 
and in Massachusetts the Sedgwicks, the Follens, 
Mr. and Mrs. Ellis Gray Loring, Mr. and Mrs. 
Charles G. Loring, Dr. Channing, Mr. and Mrs. 



HARRIET MARTIN EAU 297 

Henry Ware, Dr. Flint of Salem, and Ephraim 
Peabody. 

When Miss Martineau had identified herself 
with Mr. Garrison and his friends by taking part 
in their meetings, those who had merely sought 
her on account of her position and reputation natu- 
rally fell away. But it may be doubted whether 
she was in such danger of being mobbed or mur- 
dered as she and her editor suppose. She seems 
to think that Mr. Henry Ware did a very brave 
deed in driving to Mr. Francis Jackson's house to 
take her home from an antislavery meeting. She 
speaks of the reign of terror which existed in Bos- 
ton at that time. No doubt she, and other Aboli- 
tionists, had their share of abuse ; but it is not 
probable that any persons were, as she thought, 
plotting against her life. She and her friends 
were deterred from taking a proposed journey to 
Cincinnati and Louisville by being informed that 
it was intended to mob her in the first city and 
to hang her in the second. Now, the writer of this 
article was at that time residing in Louisville, and 
though antislavery discussions and antislavery lec- 
tures had taken place there about that period, and 
though antislavery articles not unfrequently ap- 
peared in the city journals, no objection or opposi- 
tion was made to all this by anybody in that place. 
In fact, it was easier at that time to speak against 
slavery in Louisville than in Boston. The leading 
people in Kentucky of all parties were then openly 



298 HARRIET MARTWEATJ 

opposed to slavery, and declared their hope and 
purpose of making Kentucky a free State. A year 
later, Dr. Channing published his work on slav- 
ery, which was denounced for its abolitionism by 
the " Boston Statesman," and sharply criticised in 
a pamphlet by the Massachusetts attorney-general. 
But copious extracts from this work, especially of 
the parts which exposed the sophisms of the de- 
fenders of slavery, were published in a Louisville 
magazine, and not the least objection was made 
to it in that city. At a later period it might have 
been different, though an antislavery paper was 
published in Louisville as late as 1845, one of the 
editors being a native Kentuckian. 

After her return from the United States she 
published her two works, " Society in America," 
and " Retrospect of Western Travel ; " and then 
wrote her first novel, " Deerbrook." The books 
on America were perhaps the best then written by 
any foreigner except De Tocqueville. They were 
generous, honest, kind, and utterly frank, — they 
were full of capital descriptions of American 
scenery. She spoke the truth to us, and she 
spoke it in love. The chief fault in these works 
was her tone of dogmatism, and her ex cathedra 
judgments ; which, as we have before hinted, are 
among the defects of her qualities. 

In 1838, when thirty-six years old, she was 
taken with serious illness, which confined her to 
her room for six years. She attributes this illness 



HARRIET MARTIN EAU 299 

to her anxiety about her aged aunt and mother. 
Her mother, she tells us, was irritable on account 
of Miss Martineau's fame and position in society ; 
in short, she was jealous of her daughter's success. 
Miss Martineau was obliged to sit up late after 
midnight to mend her own clothes, as she was not 
allowed to have a maid or to hire a working- 
woman, even at her own expense. How she could 
have been prevented is difficult to see, especially as 
she was the money-making member of the family. 
It seems hardly worth while to give us this glimpse 
into domestic difficulties. But, no doubt, she is 
quite correct in adding, as another reason for her 
illness, the toils which were breaking her down. 
The strongest men could hardly bear such a strain 
on the nervous system without giving way. 

And here comes in the important episode of Mr. 
Atkinson, mesmerism, and the New Philosophy. 
She believes that she was cured of a disease, pro- 
nounced incurable by the regular physicians, by 
mesmerism. By this she means the influence ex- 
erted upon her by certain manipulations from 
another person. And as long as we are con- 
fessedly so ignorant of nervous diseases, there 
seems no reason to question the facts to which 
Miss Martineau testifies. She was, there is little 
doubt, cured by these manipulations ; what the 
power was which wrought through them remains 
to be ascertained. 

In regard to Mr. Atkinson and his philosophy, 



300 HARRIET MARTINEAU 

accepted by her with such satisfaction, and which 
henceforth became the master-light of all her see- 
ing, our allotted space will allow us only to speak 
very briefly. The results of this new mental de- 
parture could not but disturb and afflict many of 
her friends, to whom faith in God, Christ, and 
immortality was still dear. To Miss Martineau 
herself, however, her disbelief in these seemed a 
happy emancipation. She carried into the asser- 
tion of her new and unpopular ideas the same 
honesty and courage she had always shown, and 
also the same superb dogmatism and contempt for 
those who differed from her. Apparently it was 
always to her an absolute impossibility to imagine 
herself wrong when she had once come to a con- 
clusion. In theory she might conceive it possible 
to be mistaken, but practically she felt herself 
infallible. The following examples will show how 
she speaks, throughout her biography, of those 
who held the opinions she had rejected. 

Miss Martineau, being a Necessarian, says, 
" All the best minds I know are Necessarians ; all, 
indeed, who are qualified to discuss the subject at 
all." " The very smallest amount of science is 
enough to enable any rational being to see that 
the constitution and action of will are determined 
by the influences beyond the control of the posses- 
sor of the faculty." She adds, that for more than 
thirty years she has seen how awful " are the evils 
which arise from that monstrous remnant of old 



HARRIET MARTIN E ATI 301 

superstition, — the supposition of a self-deter- 
mining power, etc." Now, among those she had 
intimately known were Dr. Channing and James 
Martineau, neither of them believing in the doc- 
trine of Necessity. 

Speaking of Christianity, after she had rejected 
it, she calls it " a monstrous superstition." Else- 
where she speaks of " the Christian superstition of 
the contemptible nature of the body ; " says that 
" Christians deprave their moral sense ; " talks of 
" the selfish complacencies of religion," and of 
" the atmosphere of selfishness which is the very 
life of Christian doctrine and of every other theo- 
logical scheme ; " speaks of " the Christian mytho- 
logy as a superstition which fails to make happy, 
fails to make good, fails to make wise, and has be- 
come as great an obstacle in the way of progress 
as the prior mythologies it took the place of." 
" For three centuries it has been undermined, and 
its overthrow completely decided." Thus easily 
does she settle the question of Christianity. 

Miss Martineau ceased to believe in immortal- 
ity ; and immediately all believers in immortality 
became, to her mind, selfish or stupid, or both. 
" I neither wish to live longer here," she says, 
" nor to find life again elsewhere. It seems to me 
simply absurd to expect it, and a mere act of 
restricted human imagination and morality to con- 
ceive of it." There is " a total absence of evi- 
dence for a renewed life." " I myself utterly dis- 



302 HARRIET MARTIN E ATI 

believe in a future life." She would submit, 
though reluctantly, to live again, if compelled to. 
" If I find myself conscious after the lapse of life, 
it will be all right, of course ; but, as I said, the 
supposition appears to me absurd." 

Under the instructions of Mr. Atkinson, Miss 
Martineau ceased to believe in a personal .God, or 
any God but an unknown First Cause, identical 
with the Universe. The argument for Design, on 
which Mr. John Stuart Mill, for instance, lays 
such stress, seemed to her " puerile and unphilo- 
sophical." The God of Christians she calls an 
" invisible idol." He " who does justice to his 
own faculties " must give up " the personality of 
the First Cause." She considered the religion in 
her " Life in the Sick-Eoom " to have been " in- 
sincere ; " which we, who know the perfect honesty 
of Harriet Martineau, must take the liberty to 
deny. Though declaring herself to be no Atheist, 
because she believes in an unknown and unknow- 
able First Cause, she regards philosophical Athe- 
ists as the best people she had ever known, and 
was delighted in finding herself w?iacquainted with 
God, and so at peace. 

It is curious to read these " Letters on the Laws 
of Man's Nature and Development," of which 
Harriet Martineau and Mr. Atkinson are the joint 
authors. The simple joy with which they declare 
themselves the proud discoverers of this, happy 
land of the unknowable is almost touching. All 



HARRIET MARTINEAU 303 

that we know, say they, is matter or its manifesta- 
tion. " Mind is the product of the brain," and 
" the brain is not, as even some phrenologists have 
asserted, the instrument of the mind." The brain 
is the source of consciousness, will, reason. Man 
is " a creature of necessity." " It seems certain 
that mind, or the conditions essential to mind, is 
evolved from gray vesicular matter." "Nothing 
in nature indicates a future life." " Knowledge 
recognizes that nothing can be free, or by chance ; 
no, not even God, — God is the substance of 
Law." Whereupon Miss Martineau inquires 
whether Mr. Atkinson, in speaking of God, did 
not merely use another name for Law. " We 
know nothing beyond law, do we?" asks this 
meek disciple, seeking for information. Mr. At- 
kinson replies that we must assume some funda- 
mental principle "as a thing essential, though 
unknown ; and it is this which I wrongly enough 
perhaps termed God." But if it is wrong to call 
this principle God, and if they know nothing else 
behind phenomena, why do they complain so bit- 
terly at being charged with Atheism ? And di- 
rectly Mr. Atkinson asserts that " Philosophy 
finds no God in nature ; no personal being or 
creator, nor sees the want of any." " A Creator 
after the likeness of man " he affirms to be " an 
impossibility." For, though he professes to know 
nothing about God, he somehow contrives to know 
that God is not what others believe him to be. 



304 HARRIET MARTINEAU 

Eternal sleep after death lie professes to be the 
only hope of a wise man. The idea of free-will is 
so absurd that it " would make a Democritus fall 
on his back and roar with laughter/' " Chris- 
tianity is neither reasonable nor moral." Miss 
Martineau responds that " deep and sweet " is her 
repose in the conviction that " there is no theory 
of God, of an author of Nature, of an origin of the 
Universe, which is not utterly repugnant to my 
faculties ; which is not (to my feelings) so irreve- 
rent as to make me blush, so misleading as to 
make me mourn." And thus do the apostle and 
the disciple go on, triumphantly proclaiming their 
own limitations to the end of the volume. 

And yet the effect of this book is by no means 
wholly disagreeable. To be sure, in their constant 
assertions of the " impossibility " of any belief but 
their own being true, their honest narrowness may 
often be a little amusing. They seem like two eye- 
less fish in the recesses of the darkness of the Mam- 
moth Cave talking to each other of the absurdity 
of believing in any sun or upper world. But they 
are so honest, so sincere, so much in love with 
Truth, and so free from any self-seeking, that we 
find it easy to sympathize with their nai've sense of 
discovery, as they go sounding on their dim and 
perilous way. Only we cannot but think what a 
disappointment it must be to Harriet Martineau 
to find herself alive again in the other world. In 
her case, as Mr. Wentworth Higginson acutely 



HARRIET MARTIN EAU 305 

t 
remarks, we are deprived of the pleasure of sym- 
pathizing with her gladness at discovering her 
mistake, since another life will be to her a disa- 
greeable as well as an unforeseen event. 

Nor is it extraordinary, to those who trace 
Harriet Martineau's intellectual history, that she 
should have fallen into these melancholy conclu- 
sions. In her childhood and youth, most of the 
Unitarians of England, followers of Priestley, 
adopted his philosophy of materialism and neces- 
sity. Priestley did not believe in a soul, but 
trusted for a future life to the resurrection of the 
body. He was also a firm believer in philosophi- 
cal necessity. An active and logical mind like 
Miss Martineau's, destitute of the keenness and 
profundity which belonged to that of her brother 
James, might very naturally arrive at a disbelief 
in anything but matter and its phenomena. From 
ignorance of these facts, Mrs. Chapman expresses 
surprise that the inconsistency of Harriet Marti- 
neau's belief in necessity, with other parts of her 
Unitarianism, " should not have struck herself, her 
judges, or the denomination at large." It would 
have been inconsistent with American Unitarian- 
ism, but it was not foreign from the views of Eng- 
lish Unitarians at that time. 

The publication of these " Letters " naturally 
caused pain to religious people, and especially to 
those of them who had known and honored Miss 
Martineau for her many past services in the cause 



306 HARRIET MARTINEAU 

of human freedom and progress. Many of these 
were Unitarians and Unitarian ministers, who had 
been long proud of her as a member of their de- 
nomination and one of their most valued co-work- 
ers. It seemed necessary for them to declare their 
dissent from her new views, and this dissent was 
expressed in an article in the " Prospective Re- 
view," written by her own brother, James Marti- 
neau. Mrs. Chapman now makes known, what has 
hitherto been only a matter of conjecture, that this 
review gave such serious offense to Miss Marti- 
neau that she from that time refused to recognize 
her brother or to have any further communication 
with him. Mrs. Chapman, who seldom or never 
finds her heroine in the wrong, justifies and ap- 
proves her conduct also here, quoting a passage 
from the review in support of Miss Martineau' s 
conduct in treating her brother as one. of "the 
defamers of old times whom she must never again 
meet." In this passage Mr. Martineau only ex- 
presses his profound grief that his sister should sit 
at the feet of such a master as Mr. Atkinson, and 
lay down at his bidding her early faith in moral 
obligation, in the living God, in the immortal 
sanctities. He calls this " an inversion of the 
natural order of nobleness," implying that Mr. 
Atkinson ought to have sat at her feet instead ; 
and, turning to the review itself, we find this the 
only passage in which a single word is said, which 
could be regarded as a censure on Miss Martineau. 



HARRIET MARTIN EAU 307 

But Mr. Atkinson is indeed handled with some 
severity. His language is criticised, and his logic 
is proved fallacious. Much the largest part of the 
review is, however, devoted to a refutation of his 
philosophy and doctrines. Now, as so large a part 
of the " Letters " is pervaded with denunciations 
of the bigotry which will not hear the other side of 
a question, and filled with admiration of those who 
prefer truth to the ties of kindred, friendship, and 
old association, we should have thought that Miss 
Martineau would rejoice in having a brother who 
could say, " Arnica Harriet, sed magis arnica Veri- 
tas." Not at all. It was evident that he had said 
nothing about herself at which she could take 
offense ; but in speaking against her new philoso- 
phy and her new philosopher he had committed 
the unpardonable sin. And Mrs. Chapman allows 
herself to regard it as a natural inference that 
this honest and manly review resulted from " mas- 
culine terror, fraternal jealousy of superiority, with 
a sectarian and provincial impulse to pull down 
and crush a world-wide celebrity." She consid- 
ers it " incomprehensible in an advocate of free 
thought " that he should express his thoughts 
freely in opposition to a book which argued 
against all possible knowledge of God and against 
all faith in a future life. It is, however, only just 
to Miss Martineau to say that she herself has 
brought no such charges against her brother, but 
left the matter in silence. We cannot but think 



308 HAERIET MARTIN EAU 

that it would have been better for Miss Marti- 
neau's reputation if her biographer had followed 
her example. 

But, though we must object to Mrs. Chapman's 
views on this point, and on some others, we must 
add that her part of the second volume is prepared 
with much ability, and is evidently the result of 
diligent and loyal friendship. Miss Martineau 
could not have selected a more faithful friend to 
whom to confide the history of her life. On two 
subjects, however, we are obliged to dissent from 
her statements. One is in regard to Dr. Chan- 
ning, whom she, for some unknown reason, syste- 
matically disparages. He was a good man, Mrs. 
Chapman admits, "but not in any sense a great 
one. With benevolent intentions, he could not 
greatly help the nineteenth century, for he knew 
very little about it, or, indeed, of any other. He 
had neither insight, courage, nor firmness. In his 
own Church had sprung up a vigorous opposition 
to slavery, which he innocently, in so far as igno- 
rantly, used the little strength he had to stay." 
Certainly it is not necessary to defend the memory 
of Dr. Channing against such a supercilious judg- 
ment as this. But we might well ask why, if he is 
not a great man, and did not help the nineteenth 
century, his works should continue to be circu- 
lated all over Europe ? Why should such men in 
France as Laboulaye and Bemusat occupy them- 
selves in translating and diffusing them ? Why 









HABBIET MARTIN EAU 309 

should Bunsen class him among the five prophets 
of the Divine Consciousness in Human History, — 
speaking of " his fearless speech," his unfailing 
good sense," and "his grandeur of soul, which 
makes him a prophet of the Christianity of the 
Future " ? Bunsen calls him a Greek in his 
manly nature, a Roman in his civic qualities, and 
an apostle in his Christianity. And was that man 
deficient in courage or firmness who never faltered 
in the support of any opinions, however unpopu- 
lar, whether it was to defend Unitarianism in its 
weak beginnings, to appear in Faneuil Hall as 
the leader against the defenders of the Alton mob, 
to head the petition for the pardon of Abner 
Kneeland, and to lay on the altar of antislavery 
the fame acquired by past labors ? Is he to be 
accused of repressing the antislavery movement 
in his own church, when there is on record the 
letter in which he advocated giving the use of the 
church building to the society represented by Mrs. 
Chapman herself ; and when the men of influence 
in his society refused it? Nor, in those days of 
their unpopularity, did Mrs. Chapman and her 
friends count Dr. Channing's aid so insignificant. 
In her article on " The Martyr Age," Miss Mar- 
tineau describes the profound impression caused by 
Dr. Channing's sudden appearance in the State 
House to give his countenance and aid to Garri- 
son and the Abolitionists, in what, she says, was a 
matter to them of life and death. And she adds, 



310 HARRIET MARTIN EAU 

" He was thenceforth considered by the world an 
accession to their principles, though not to their 
organized body." 

Nor do we quite understand Mrs. Chapman's 
giving to Miss Martineau the credit of being the 
cause of the petition for the pardon of Abner 
Kneeland ; as his conviction, and the consequent 
petition, did not take place until she had been 
nearly two years out of the country. And why 
does Mrs. Chapman select for special contempt, as 
unfaithful to their duty to mankind, the Unitarian 
ministers ? Why does she speak of " the cowardly 
ranks of American Unitarians " with such peculiar 
emphasis ? It is not our business here to defend 
this denomination ; but we cannot but recall the 
"Protest against American Slavery " prepared and 
signed in 1845 by one hundred and seventy-three 
Unitarian ministers, out of a body containing not 
more than two hundred and fifty in all. And it 
was this body which furnished to the cause some 
of its most honored members. Of those who have 
belonged to the Unitarian body, we now recall the 
names of such persons as Samuel J. May, Samuel 
May, Josiah Quincy, John Quincy Adams, John 
Pierpont, Mr. and Mrs. Ellis Gray Loring, John 
G. Palfrey, John P. Hale, Dr. and Mrs. Follen, 
Theodore Parker, John Parkman, John T. Sar- 
gent, James Russell Lowell, Wm. H. Furness, 
Charles Sumner, Caleb Stetson, John A. Andrew, 
Lydia Maria Child, Dr. S. G. Howe, Horace 



HARRIET MARTIN EAU 311 

Mann, T. W. Higginson. So much for the " cow- 
ardly ranks of American Unitarians." 

The last years of Miss Martineau were happy 
and peaceful. She had a pleasant home at Am- 
bleside, on Lake Windermere. She had many 
friends, was conscious of having done a good work, 
and if she had no hopes in the hereafter, neither 
had she any fears concerning it. She was a 
strong, upright, true-hearted woman ; one of those 
who have helped to vindicate " the right of women 
to learn the alphabet." 



THE RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE 
POWER IN AMERICA 1 

On the first day of January, 1832, when the 
American Antislavery Society was formed in the 
office of Samuel E. Sewall in Boston, the abolition 
of slavery through any such agency seemed impos- 
sible. Almost all the great interests of the country 
were combined to defend and sustain the system. 
The capital invested in slaves amounted to at least 
one thousand millions of dollars. This vast pecuni- 
ary interest was rapidly increasing by the growing 
demand for the cotton crop of the Southern States 
— a demand which continually overlapped the sup- 
ply. The whole political power of the thirteen 
slave States was in the hands of the slaveholders. 
No white man in the South, unless he was a slave- 
holder, was ever elected to Congress, or to any im- 
portant political position at home. The two great 
parties, Whig and Democrat, were pledged to the 
support of slavery in all its constitutional rights, 
and vied with each other in giving to these the 
largest interpretation. By a constitutional provi- 
sion, which could not be altered, the slave States 

1 " History of the Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America," 
by Henry Wilson, North American Review, January, 1875. 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 313 

had in Congress, in 1840, twenty-five more Repre- 
sentatives in proportion to their number of voters 
than the free States. By the cohesion of this great 
political and pecuniary interest the slaveholders, 
though comparatively few in number, were able to 
govern the nation. The Presidents, both houses of 
Congress, the Supreme Court of the United States, 
the two great political parties, the press of the 
country, the mercantile interest, and that mysteri- 
ous force which we call society, were virtually in 
the hands of the slaveholders. Whenever their 
privileges were attacked, all these powers rallied 
to their defense. Public opinion, in the highest 
circles of society and in the lowest, was perfectly 
agreed on this one question. The saloons of the 
Fifth Avenue and the mob of the Five Points w r ere 
equally loyal to the sacred cause of slavery. Thus 
all the great powers which control free states were 
combined for its defense ; and the attempt to as- 
sail this institution might justly be regarded as 
madness. In fact, all danger seemed so remote, 
that even so late as 1840 it was common for slave- 
holders to admit that property in man was an ab- 
surdity and an injustice. The system itself was so 
secure, that they could afford to concede its prin- 
ciple to their opponents. Just as men formerly 
fought duels as a matter of course, while frankly 
admitting that it was wrong to do so, — just as at 
the present time we concede that war is absurd and 
unchristian, but yet go to war continually, because 



314 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

we know no other way of settling international dis- 
putes, — so the slaveholders used to say, " Slavery 
is wrong ; we know that : but how is it to be abol- 
ished ? What can we do about it ? " 

Such was the state of things in the United States 
less than half a century ago. On one side was an 
enormous pecuniary interest, vast political power, 
the weight of the press, an almost unanimous pub- 
lic opinion, the necessities of commerce, the au- 
thority of fashion, the teachings of nearly every 
denomination in the Christian church, and the 
moral obligations attributed to the sacred cove- 
nants of the fathers of the Republic. On the other 
side there were only a few voices crying in the wil- 
derness, " It is unjust to claim property in man." 
The object of the work before us is to show how, 
after the slave power had reached this summit of 
influence, it lost it all in a single generation ; how, 
less by the zeal of its opponents than by the mad- 
ness of its defenders, this enormous fabric of op- 
pression was undermined and overthrown ; and 
how, in a few years, the insignificant handful of 
antislavery people brought to their side the great 
majority of the nation. 

Certainly a work which should do justice to such 
a history would be one of the most interesting 
books ever written. For in this series of events 
everything was involved which touches most nearly 
the mind, the conscience, the imagination, and the 
heart of man. How many radical problems in 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 315 

statesmanship, in political economy, in ethics, in 
philosophy, in theology, in history, in science, came 
up for discussion during this long controversy ! 
What pathetic stories of suffering, what separation 
of families, what tales of torture, what cruelty 
grown into a custom, what awful depths of misery, 
came continually to light, as though the judgment- 
day were beginning to dawn on the dark places of 
the earth ! What romances of adventure, what 
stories of courage and endurance, of ingenuity in 
contrivance, of determination of soul, were listened 
to by breathless audiences as related by the humble 
lips of the fugitives from bondage ! How trite 
and meagre became all the commonplaces of ora- 
tory before the flaming eloquence of these terri- 
ble facts ! How tame grew all the conventional 
rhetoric of pulpit and platform, by the side of 
speech vitalized by the immediate presence of this 
majestic argument ! The book which should re- 
produce the antislavery history of those thirty years 
would possess an unimagined charm. 

We cannot say that Mr. Wilson's volumes do all 
this, nor had we any right to expect it. He pro- 
poses to himself nothing of the sort. What he 
gives us is, however, of very great value. It is a 
very carefully collected, clearly arranged, and accu- 
rate account of the rise and progress, decline and 
catastrophe, of slavery in the United States. Mr. 
Wilson does not attempt to be philosophical like 
Bancroft and Draper ; nor are his pages as pictu- 



316 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

resque as are those of Motley and Carlyle. He 
tells us a plain unvarnished tale, the interest of 
which is to be found in the statement of the facts 
exactly as they occurred. Considering that it is a 
story of events all of which he saw and a large part 
of which he was, there is a singular absence of pre- 
judice. He is no man's enemy. He has passed 
through the fire, and there is no smell of smoke on 
his garments. An intelligent indignation against 
the crimes committed in defense of the system he 
describes pervades his narrative. His impartiality 
is not indifference, but an absence of personal ran- 
cor. Individuals and their conduct are criticised 
only so far as is necessary to make clear the course 
of events and the condition of public feeling. The 
defenders of slavery at the North and South are 
regarded not as bad men, but as the outcome of a 
bad system. 

Mr. Wilson's book is a treasury of facts, and 
will never be superseded so far as this peculiar 
value is concerned. In this respect it somewhat 
resembles Hildreth's "History of the United 
States." Taking little space for speculation, com- 
ment, or picturesque coloring, there is all the more 
room left for the steady flow of the narrative. 

With a few unimportant omissions, the two vol- 
umes now published contain a full history of slav- 
ery and antislavery from the Ordinance of 1787 
and the compromises of the Constitution down to 
the election of Lincoln and the outbreak of the 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 317 

civil war. As a work of reference they are invalu- 
ble, for each event in the long struggle for freedom 
is distinctly and accurately told, while the calm 
story advances through its various stages. Instead 
of following this narrative in detail, which our space 
will not allow, we prefer to call our readers' atten- 
tion to some of the more striking incidents of this 
great revolution. 

Our fathers, when they founded the nation, had 
little thought that slavery was ever to attain such 
vast extension. They supposed that it would grad- 
ually die out from the South, as it had disappeared 
from the North. Yet the whole danger to their 
work lay here. Slavery, if anything, was the 
wedge which was to split the Union asunder. 
When the Constitution was formed, in 1787, the 
slaveholders, by dint of great effort, succeeded in 
getting the little end of the wedge inserted. It 
was very narrow, a mere sharp line, and it went in 
only a very little way ; so it seemed to be nothing 
at all. The slaveholders at that time did not con- 
tend that slavery was right or good. They ad- 
mitted that it was a political evil. They confessed, 
many of them, that it was a moral evil. All the 
great Southern revolutionary bodies had accus- 
tomed themselves to believe in the rights of man, 
in the principles of humanity, in the blessings of 
liberty ; and they could not defend slavery. Ma- 
son of Virginia, in the debates in the Federal Con- 
vention, denounced slavery and the slave-trade. 



318 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

" The evil of slavery," said he, " affects the whole 
Union. Slavery discourages arts and manufac- 
tures. The poor despise labor when done by 
slaves. They prevent the immigration of whites, 
who really enrich a country. They produce the 
most pernicious effects on the manners. Every mas- 
ter of slaves is born a petty tyrant. They bring the 
judgment of Heaven on a country." Williamson 
of North Carolina declared himself in principle 
and practice opposed to slavery. Madison " thought 
it wrong to admit in the Constitution the idea that 
there could be property in man." But the extreme 
Southern States, South Carolina and Georgia, in- 
sisted on the right of importing slaves, at least for 
a little while ; and so they were allowed to import 
them for twenty years. They also insisted on hav- 
ing their slaves represented by themselves in Con- 
gress, and so they were allowed to count three 
fifths of the slaves in determining the ratio. This 
seemed a small thing, but it was the entering of 
the wedge. It was tolerating the principle of slav- 
ery; not admitting it, but tolerating it. At the 
same time that this Convention was forming, the 
Federal Constitution Congress was prohibiting 
slavery in all the territory northwest of the Ohio. 
This prohibition of slavery was adopted by the 
unanimous votes of the eight States present, includ- 
ing Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia. Two 
years later it was recognized and confirmed by the 
first Congress under the Constitution. Jefferson, 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 319 

a commissioner to revise the statute law of Vir- 
ginia, prepared a bill for gradual emancipation in 
that State. In 1790 a petition was presented to 
Congress, signed by Benjamin Franklin, the last 
public act of his life, declaring equal liberty to be 
the birthright of all, and asking Congress to " de- 
vise means for restoring liberty to the slaves, and 
so removing this inconsistency from the character 
of the American people." In 1804 the people of 
Virginia petitioned Congress to have the Ordinance 
of 1787 suspended, that they might hold slaves ; 
but a committee of Congress, of which John Ran- 
dolph of Virginia was chairman, reported that it 
would be " highly dangerous and inexpedient to 
impair a provision wisely calculated to promote the 
happiness and prosperity of the Northwest Terri- 
tory." 

But in 1820 the first heavy blow came on the 
wedge to drive it into the log. The Union is a 
tough log, and the wedge could be driven a good 
way in without splitting it ; but the first blow 
which drove it in was the adopting the Missouri 
Compromise, allowing slavery to come North and 
take possession of Missouri. 

The thirty years of prosperity which had fol- 
lowed the adoption of the Constitution had changed 
the feelings of men both North and South. The 
ideas of the Revolution had receded into the back- 
ground ; the thirst for wealth and power had taken 
their place. So the Southern States, which had 



320 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

cordially agreed thirty years before to prohibit the 
extension of slavery, and had readily admitted it 
to be a political evil, now demanded as a right the 
privilege of carrying slaves into Missouri. They 
threatened to dissolve the Union, talked of a fire 
only to be extinguished by seas of blood, and pro- 
posed to hang a member from New Hampshire 
who spoke of liberty. Some of the Northern men 
were not frightened by these threats, and valued 
them at their real worth. But we know that the 
result was a compromise. Slavery was to take 
possession of Missouri, on condition that no other 
State as far north as Missouri should be slave- 
holding. Slavery was to be excluded from the 
rest of the territory forever. This bargain was 
applauded and justified by Southern politicians 
and newspapers as a great triumph on their part ; 
and it was. That fatal compromise was a surren- 
der of principle for the sake of peace, bartering 
conscience for quiet ; and we were soon to reap the 
bitter fruits. 

Face to face, in deadly opposition, each deter- 
mined on the total destruction of his antagonist, 
stood this Goliath of the slave power and the little 
David of antislavery, at the beginning of the ten 
years which extended from 1830 to 1840. The 
giant was ultimately to fall from the wounds of 
his minute opponent, but not during this decade 
or the next. For many years each of the parties 
was growing stronger, and the fight was growing 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 321 

fiercer. Organization on the one side was continu- 
ally becoming more powerful ; enthusiasm on the 
other continually built up a more determined opin- 
ion. The slave power won repeated victories ; but 
every victory increased the number and ardor of 
its opponents. 

The first attempt to destroy antislavery princi- 
ples was by means of mobs. Mobs seldom take 
place in a community unless where the upper stra- 
tum of society and the lower are in sympathetic 
opposition to some struggling minority. Then the 
lower class takes its convictions from the higher, 
and regards itself as the hand executing what the 
head thinks ought to be done. Respectability de- 
nounces the victim, and the rabble hastens to take 
vengeance on him. Even a mob cannot act effi- 
ciently unless inspired by ideas ; and these it must 
receive from some higher source. So it was when 
Priestley was mobbed at Birmingham ; so it was 
when Wesley and his friends were mobbed in all 
parts of England. So it was also in America when 
the office of the " Philanthropist " was destroyed 
in Cincinnati ; when halls and churches were 
burned in Philadelphia ; when Miss Crandall was 
mobbed in Connecticut ; when Lovejoy was killed 
at Alton. Antislavery meetings were so often in- 
vaded by rioters, that on one occasion Stephen 
S. Foster is reported to have declared that the 
speakers were not doing their duty, because the 
people listened so quietly. "If we were doing 



322 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

our duty," said he, " they would be throwing brick- 
bats at us." 

These demonstrations only roused and intensi- 
fied the ardor of the Abolitionists, while bringing 
to their side those who loved fair play, and those 
in whom the element of battle was strong. Mobs 
also were an excellent advertisement for the Anti- 
slavery Society ; and this is what every new cause 
needs most for its extension. Every time that one 
of their meetings was violently broken up, every 
time that any outrage or injury was offered to the 
Abolitionists, all the newspapers in the land gave 
them a gratuitous advertisement by conspicuous 
notices of the event. So the public mind was di- 
rected to the question, and curiosity was excited. 
The antislavery conventions were more crowded 
from day to day, their journals were more in de- 
mand, and their plans and opinions became the 
subject of conversation everywhere. 

And certainly there could be no more interesting 
place to visit than one of these meetings of the 
Antislavery Society. With untiring assiduity the 
Abolitionists brought to their platform everything 
which could excite and impress their audience. 
Their orators were of every kind, — rough men 
and shrill-voiced women, polished speakers from 
the universities, stammering fugitives from slavery, 
philosophers and fanatics, atheists and Christian 
ministers, wise men who had been made mad by 
oppression, and babes in intellect to whom God 



EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 323 

had revealed some of the noblest truths. They 
murdered the King's English, they uttered glaring 
fallacies, the blows aimed at evildoers often glanced 
aside and hit good men. Invective was, perhaps, 
the too frequent staple of their argument, and any 
difference of opinion would be apt to turn their 
weapons against each other. This church-militant 
often became a church-termagant. Yet, after all 
such abatement for errors of judgment or bad taste, 
their meetings were a splendid arena on which was 
fought one of the greatest battles for mankind. 
The eloquence we heard there was not of the 
schools, and had nothing artificial about it. It 
followed the rule of Demosthenes, and was all di- 
rected to action. Every word was a blow. There 
was no respect for dignities or authorities. The 
Constitution of the United States, the object of 
such unfeigned idolatry to the average American, 
was denounced as "a covenant with hell." The 
great men of the nation, Webster, Clay, Jackson, 
were usually selected as the objects of the severest 
censure. The rule was to strike at the heads 
which rose above the crowd, as deserving the 
sternest condemnation. Presidents and gover- 
nors, heads of universities, eminent divines, great 
churches and denominations, were convicted as 
traitors to the right, or held up to unsparing ridi- 
cule. No conventional proprieties were regarded 
in the terrible earnestness of this enraged speech. 
It was like the lava pouring from the depths of 



324 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

the earth, and melting the very rocks which op- 
posed its resistless course. 

Of course this fierce attack roused as fierce a 
defense. One extreme generated the other. The 
cry for " immediate abolition " was answered by 
labored defenses of slavery itself. Formerly its 
advocates only excused it as a necessary evil ; now 
they began to defend it as a positive good. Then 
was seen the lamentable sight of Christian minis- 
ters and respected divines hurrying to the support 
of the " sum of all villanies." The Episcopal 
bishop of a New England State defended with 
ardor the system of slavery as an institution sup- 
ported by the Bible and commanded by God him- 
self. The president of a New England college 
declared slavery to be a positive institution of 
revealed religion, and not inconsistent with the 
law of love. The minister of a Boston church, 
going to the South for his health, amused his 
leisure by writing a book on slavery, in which it is 
made to appear as a rose-colored and delightful 
institution, and its opposers are severely censured. 
One of the most learned professors in a Massa- 
chusetts theological school composed a treatise to 
refute the heresy of the higher law, and to main- 
tain the duty of returning fugitive slaves to bond- 
age. Under such guidance it was natural that the 
churches should generally stand aloof from the 
Abolitionists and condemn their course. It was 
equally natural that the Abolitionists should then 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 325 

denounce the churches as the bulwark of slavery. 
Nevertheless, from the Christian body came most 
of those who devoted their lives to the extirpation 
of this great evil and iniquity. And Mr. Garri- 
son, at least, always maintained that his converts 
were most likely to be made among those whose 
consciences had been educated by the Church and 
the Bible. 

From public meetings in the North, the conflict 
of ideas next extended itself to the floor of Congress, 
where it continued to rage during nearly thirty 
years, until " the war of tongue and pen " changed 
to that of charging squadrons, the storm of shot 
and the roll of cannon. The question found its 
way into the debates of Congress in the form of 
petitions for the abolition of slavery and the slave- 
trade in the District of Columbia. If the slave- 
holders had allowed these petitions to be received 
and referred, taking no notice of them, it seems 
probable that no important results would have 
followed. But, blinded by rage and fear, they 
opposed their reception, thus denying a privilege 
belonging to all mankind, — that of asking the 
government to redress their grievances. Then 
came to the front a man already eminent by his 
descent, his great attainments, his long public 
service, his great position, and his commanding 
ability. John Quincy Adams, after having been 
President of the United States, accepted a seat in 
the House of Representatives, and was one of the 



326 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

most laborious and useful of its members. He 
was not then an Abolitionist, nor in favor even of 
abolishing slavery in the District of Columbia. 
But he believed that the people had the right to 
petition the government for anything they desired, 
and that their respectful petitions should be re- 
spectfully received. Sixty-five years old in 1832, 
when he began this conflict, his warfare with the 
slave power ended only when, struck with death 
while in his seat, he saw the last of earth and was 
content. With what energy, what dauntless cour- 
age, what untiring industry, what matchless powers 
of argument, what inexhaustible resources of know- 
ledge, he pursued his object, the future historian 
of the struggle who can fully paint what Mr. 
Wilson is only able to indicate, will take pleasure 
in describing. One scene will remain forever mem- 
orable as one of the most striking triumphs of 
human oratory; and this we must describe a little 
more fully. 

February 6, 1837, being the day for presenting 
petitions, Mr. Adams had already presented 
several petitions for the abolition of slavery in the 
District of Columbia (a measure to which he was 
himself then opposed), when he proceeded to state * 
that he had in his possession a paper upon which 
he wished the decision of the Speaker. The paper, 
he said, came from twenty persons declaring them- 
selves to be slaves. He wished to know whether 

m 

1 Congressional Globe for February 6, 1837. 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 327 

the Speaker would consider this paper as coming 
under the rule of the House. 1 The Chair said he 
would take the advice of the House on that ques- 
tion. And thereupon began a storm of indigna- 
tion which raged around Mr. Adams during four 
days. 2 Considering that the House had ordered, 
less than three weeks before, that all papers re- 
lating in any way to slavery should be laid on the 
table without any action being taken on them, this 
four days' discussion about such a paper, ending 
in the passing of several resolutions, was rather an 
amusing illustration of the irrepressible character 
of the antislavery movement. The Southern mem- 
bers seemed at first astonished at what they hastily 
assumed to be an attempt of Mr. Adams to intro- 
duce a petition from slaves. One moved that it 
be not received. Another, indignant at such a 
tame way of meeting the question, declared that 
any one attempting to introduce such a petition 
should be immediately punished ; and if that was 
not done at once, all the members from the slave 
States should leave the House. Loud cries arose, 
" Expel him ! expel him ! " Mr. Alfred declared 
that the petition ought to be burned. Mr. Waddy 
Thompson of South Carolina, who soon received a 
castigation which he little anticipated, moved that 
John Quincy Adams, having committed a gross 

1 Rule adopted January 18, that all petitions relating" to slavery 
be laid on the table without any action being taken on them. 

2 February 6, 7, 9, 11. 



328 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

disrespect to the House in attempting to introduce 
a petition from slaves, ought to be instantly 
brought to the bar of the House to receive the 
severe censure of the Speaker. Similar resolu- 
tions were offered by Mr. Haynes and Mr. Lewis, 
all assuming that Mr. Adams had attempted to 
introduce this petition. He at last took the floor, 
and said that he thought the time of the House 
was being consumed needlessly, since all these 
resolutions were founded on an error. He had 
not attempted to present the petition, — he had 
only asked the Speaker a question in regard to it. 
He also advised the member from Alabama to 
amend his resolution, which stated the petition to 
be for the abolition of slavery in the District, 
whereas it was the very reverse of that. It was a 
petition for something which would be very objec- 
tionable to himself, though it might be the very 
thing for which the gentleman from Alabama was 
contending. Then Mr. Adams sat down, leaving 
his opponents more angry than ever, but some- 
what confused in their minds. They could not 
very well censure him for doing what he had not 
done, but they wished very much to censure him. 
So Mr. Waddy Thompson modified his resolution, 
making it state that Mr. Adams, " by creating the 
impression, and leaving the House under the im- 
pression, that the petition was for the abolition of 
slavery," had trifled with the House, and should 
receive its censure. After a multitude of other 



BISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 329 

speeches from the enraged Southern chivalry, the 
debate of the first day came to an end. 

On the next day (February 7), in reply to a 
question, Mr. Adams stated again that he had not 
attempted to present the petition, though his own 
feelings would have led him to do so, but had kept 
it in his possession, out of respect to the House. 
He had said nothing to lead the House to infer 
that this petition was for the abolition of slavery. 
He should consider before presenting a petition 
from slaves ; though, in his opinion, slaves had a 
right to petition, and the mere fact of a petition 
being from slaves would not of itself prevent him 
from presenting it. If the petition were a proper 
one, he should present it. A petition was a 
prayer, a supplication to a superior being. Slaves 
might pray to God ; was this House so superior 
that it could not condescend to hear a prayer from 
those to whom the Almighty listened ? He ended 
by saying that, in asking the question of the 
Speaker, he had intended to show the greatest 
respect to the House, and had not the least pur- 
pose of trifling with it. 

These brief remarks of Mr. Adams made it 
necessary for the slaveholders again to change 
their tactics. Mr. Dromgoole of Virginia now 
brought forward his famous resolution, which Mr- 
Adams afterwards made so ridiculous, accusing 
him of having "given color to an idea" that 
slaves had a right to petition, and that he should 



330 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

be censured by the Speaker for this act. Another 
member proposed, rather late in the day, that a 
committee be appointed to inquire whether any 
attempt had been made, or not, to offer a petition 
from slaves. Another offered a series of resolu- 
tions, declaring that if any one " hereafter " should 
offer petitions from slaves he ought to be regarded 
as an enemy of the South, and of the Union ; but 
that " as John Quincy Adams had stated that he 
meant no disrespect to the House, that all proceed- 
ings as to his conduct should now cease." And 
so, after many other speeches, the second day's 
debate came to an end. 

The next day was set apart to count the votes 
for President, and so the debate was resumed 
February 9. It soon become more confused than 
ever. Motions were made to lay the resolutions 
on the table ; they were withdrawn ; they were 
renewed ; they were voted down ; and, finally, 
after much discussion, and when at last the final 
question was about being taken, Mr. Adams in- 
quired whether he was to be allowed to be heard 
in his own defense before being condemned. So 
he obtained the floor, and immediately the whole 
aspect of the case was changed. During three 
days he had been the prisoner at the bar ; sud- 
denly he became the judge on the bench. Never, 
in the history of forensic eloquence, has a single 
speech effected a greater change in the purpose of 
a deliberative assembly. Often as the Horatian 



BISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 331 

description has been quoted of the just man, tena- 
cious of his purpose, who fears not the rage of citi- 
zens clamoring for what is wrong, it has never 
found a fitter application than to the unshaken 
mind of John Quincy Adams, standing alone, in 
the midst of his antagonists, like a solid monument 
which the idle storms beat against in vain. 

He began by saying that he had been waiting 
during these three days for an answer to the ques- 
tion which he had put to the Speaker, and which 
the Speaker had put to the House, but which the 
House had not yet answered, namely, whether the 
paper he held in his hand came under the rule of 
the House or not. They had discussed every- 
thing else, but had not answered that question. 
They had wasted the time of the House in consid- 
ering how they could censure him for doing what 
he had not done. All he wished to know was, 
whether a petition from slaves should be received 
or not. He himself thought that it ought to be 
received ; but if the House decided otherwise, he 
should not present it. Only one gentleman had 
undertaken to discuss that question, and his argu- 
ment was, that if slavery was abolished by Con- 
gress in any State, the Constitution was violated ; 
and, therefore, slaves ought not to be allowed to 
petition for anything. He, Mr. Adams, was un- 
able to see the connection between the premises 
and the conclusion. 

Hereupon poor Mr. French, the author of this 



332 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

argument, tried to explain what he meant by it, 
but left his meaning as confused as before. 

Then Mr. Adams added, that if you deprived 
any one in the community of the right of petition, 
which was only the right of offering a prayer, you 
would find it difficult to know where to stop ; one 
gentleman had objected to the reception of one 
petition, because offered by women of a bad char- 
acter. Mr. Patton of Virginia says he knows that 
one of the names is of a woman of a bad character. 
Sow does he know it ? 

Hereupon Mr. Patton explained that he did not 
himself know the woman, but had been told that 
her character was not good. 

So, said Mr. Adams, you first deny the right of 
petition to slaves, then to free people of color, and 
then you inquire into the moral character of a peti- 
tioner before you receive his petition. The next 
step will be to inquire into the political belief of 
the petitioners before you receive your petition. 
Mr. Robertson of Virginia had said that no peti- 
tions ought to be received for an object which Con- 
gress had no power to grant. Mr. Adams replied, 
with much acuteness, that on most questions the 
right of granting the petition might be in doubt : 
a majority must decide that point ; it would there- 
fore follow, from Mr. Robertson's rule, that no one 
had a right to petition unless he belonged to the 
predominant party. Mr. Adams then turned to 
Mr. Dromgoole, who had charged him with the 



BISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE FOWEB 333 

remarkable crime of " giving color to an idea," and 
soon made that Representative of the Old Domin- 
ion appear very ridiculous. 

Mr. Adams then proceeded to rebuke, with dig- 
nity but severity, the conduct of those who had 
proposed to censure him without any correct know- 
ledge of the facts of the case. His criticisms had 
the effect of compelling these gentlemen to excuse 
themselves and to offer various explanations of 
their mistakes. These assailants suddenly found 
themselves in an attitude of self-defense. Mr. 
Adams graciously accepted their explanations, ad- 
vising them in future to be careful when they 
undertook to offer resolutions of censure. He 
then informed Mr. Waddy Thompson of South 
Carolina that he had one or two questions to put 
to him. By this time it had become a pretty 
serious business to receive the attentions of Mr. 
Adams ; and Mr. Waddy Thompson immediately 
rose to explain. But Mr. Adams asked him to 
wait until he had fully stated the question which 
Mr. Thompson was to answer. This Southern 
statesman had threatened the ex-President of the 
United States with an indictment by the grand 
jury of the District for words spoken in debate in 
the House of Representatives, and had added that, 
if the petition was presented, Mr. Adams would be 
sent to the penitentiary. " Sir," said Mr. Adams, 
" the only answer I make to such a threat from 
that gentleman is, to invite him, when he returns 



334 BISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

to his constituents, to study a little the first prin- 
ciples of civil liberty." He then called on the 
gentlemen from the slave States to say how many 
of them indorsed that sentiment. " / do not," said 
Mr. Underwood of Kentucky. " I do not," said 
Mr. Wise of Virginia. Mr. Thompson was com- 
pelled to attempt another explanation, and said 
he meant that, in South Carolina, any member 
of the legislature who should present a petition 
from slaves could be indicted. " Then," replied 
Mr. Adams, and this produced a great sensation, 
" if it is the law of South Carolina that members 
of her Legislature may be indicted by juries for 
words spoken in debate, God Almighty receive my 
thanks that I am not a citizen of South Carolina." 

Mr. Adams ended his speech by declaring that 
the honor of the House of Representatives was 
always regarded by him as a sacred sentiment, and 
that he should feel a censure from that House as 
the heaviest misfortune of a long life, checkered 
as it had been by many vicissitudes. 

When Mr, Adams began his defense, not only 
was a large majority of the House opposed to his 
course, but they had brought themselves by a series 
of violent harangues into a condition of bitter ex- 
citement against him. When he ended, the effect 
of this extraordinary speech was such, that all the 
resolutions were rejected, and out of the whole 
House only twenty-two members could be found 
to pass a vote of even indirect censure. The 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 335 

victory was won, and won by Mr. Adams almost 
single-handed. We count Horatius Codes a hero 
for holding the Roman bridge against a host of 
enemies ; but greater honors belong to him who 
successfully defends against overwhelming num- 
bers the ancient safeguards of public liberty. For 
this reason we have repeated here at such length 
the story of three days, which the people of the 
United States ought always to remember. It took 
ten years to accomplish the actual repeal of these 
gag-laws. But the main work was done when the 
right of speech was obtained for the friends of 
freedom in Congress; and John Quincy Adams 
was the great leader in this warfare. He was 
joined on that arena by other noble champions, — 
Giddings, Mann, Palfrey, John P. Hale, Chase, 
Seward, Slade of Vermont, Julian of Indiana. 
Others no less devoted followed them, among 
whom came from Massachusetts Charles Sumner 
and Henry Wilson, the author of the present 
work. What he cannot properly say of himself 
should be said for him. Though an accomplished 
and eager politician, Henry Wilson has never sac- 
rificed any great principle for the sake of political 
success. His services to the antislavery cause 
have been invaluable, his labors in that cause un- 
remitting. Personal feelings and personal inter- 
ests he has been ready to sacrifice for the sake of 
the cause. Loyal to his friends, he has not been 
bitter to his opponents; and if any man who 



336 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

fought through that loug struggle were to be its 
historian, no one will deny the claims of Mr. Wil- 
son to that honor. 

Under the lead of John Quincy Adams, the 
power to discuss the whole subject of slavery in 
the National Legislature was won, and never again 
lost. This was the second triumph of the anti- 
slavery movement ; its first was the power won by 
Garrison and his friends of discussing the subject 
before the people. The wolfish mob in the cities 
and in Congress might continue to howl, but it had 
lost its claws and teeth. But now came the first 
great triumph of the slave power, in the annexa- 
tion of Texas. This was a cruel blow to the 
friends of freedom. It was more serious because 
the motive of annexation was openly announced, 
and the issue distinctly presented in the Presiden- 
tial election. Mr. Upshur, Tyler's Secretary of 
State, in an official dispatch, declared that the 
annexation of Texas was necessary to secure the 
institution of slavery. The Democratic Conven- 
tion which nominated Mr. Polk for the Presi- 
dency deliberately made the annexation of Texas 
the leading .feature of its platform. Nor was the 
slave power in this movement opposed merely by 
the antislavery feeling of the country. Southern 
senators helped to defeat the measure when first 
presented in the form of a treaty by Mr. Tyler's 
administration. Nearly the whole Whig party 
was opposed to it. The candidate of the Whigs, 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 337 

Henry Clay, had publicly declared that annexa- 
tion would be a great evil to the nation. Twenty 
members of Congress, with John Quincy Adams at 
their head, had proclaimed in an address to their 
constituents that it would be equivalent to a disso- 
lution of the Union. Dr. Channing, in 1838, had 
said that it would be better for the nation to per- 
ish than to commit such an outrageous wrong. 
Edward Everett, in 1837, spoke of annexation as 
"an enormous crime." Whig and Democratic 
legislatures had repeatedly denounced it. In 1843, 
when the Democrats had a majority in the Massa- 
chusetts legislature, they resolved that " under no 
circumstances whatever " could the people of Mas- 
sachusetts approve of annexation. Martin Van 
Buren opposed it as unjust to Mexico. Senator 
Benton, though previously in favor of the mea- 
sure, in a speech in Missouri declared that the 
object of those who were favoring the scheme was 
to dissolve the Union, though he afterward came 
again to its support. And yet when the Presiden- 
tial campaign was in progress, a Democratic torch- 
light procession miles long was seen marching 
through the streets of Boston, and flaunting the 
lone star of Texas along its whole line. And when 
Polk was elected, and the decision of the nation 
virtually given for this scheme, it seemed almost 
hopeless to contend longer against such a triumph 
of slavery. If the people of the North could sub- 
mit to this outrage, it appeared as if they could 
submit to anything. 



338 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

Such, however, was not the case. On one side 
the slave power was greatly strengthened by the 
admission of Texas to the Union as a slave State ; 
but, on the other hand, there came a large acces- 
sion to the antislavery body. And this continued 
to be the case during many years. The slave 
power won a succession of political victories, each 
of which was a moral victory to its opponents. 
Many who were not converted to antislavery by 
the annexation of Texas in 1845 were brought over 
by the defeat of the Wilmot Proviso and the pas- 
sage of the Fugitive Slave Law in 1850. Many 
who were not alarmed by these successes of slavery 
were convinced of the danger when they beheld the 
actual working of the Fugitive Slave Act. How 
many Boston gentlemen, before opposed to the 
Abolitionists, were brought suddenly to their side 
when they saw the Court House in chains, and were 
prevented by soldiers guarding Anthony Burns 
from going to their banks or insurance offices in 
State Street ! All those bitter hours of defeat and 
disaster planted the seeds of a greater harvest for 
freedom. Others who remained insensible to the 
disgrace of the slave laws of 1850 were recruited 
to the ranks of freedom by the repeal of the Mis- 
souri Compromise in 1854. This last act, Mr. 
Wilson justly says, did more than any other to 
arouse the North, and convince it of the desperate 
encroachments of slavery. Men who tamely acqui- 
esced in this great wrong were startled into moral 



EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 339 

life by the murderous assault on Charles Sumner 
by Preston Brooks in 1856. Those who could sub- 
mit to this were roused by the border ruffians from 
Missouri who invaded Kansas, and made the pro- 
slavery Constitution for that State. The Dred 
Scott decision in 1857, which declared slavery to 
be no local institution, limited to a single part of 
the land, but having a right to exist in the free 
States under the Constitution, alarmed even those 
who had been insensible to the previous aggres- 
sions of slavery. This series of political successes 
of the slave power was appalling. Every principle 
of liberty, every restraint on despotism, was over- 
thrown in succession, until the whole power of the 
nation had fallen into the hands of an oligarchy of 
between three and four hundred thousand slave- 
holders. But every one of their political victories 
was a moral defeat ; every access to their strength 
as an organization added an immense force to the 
public opinion opposed to them ; and each of their 
successes was responded to by some advance of the 
antislavery movement. The annexation of Texas 
in 1845 was answered by the appearance of John 
P. Hale, in 1847, in the United States Senate, — 
the first man who was elected to that body on dis- 
tinctly antislavery grounds and independent of 
either of the great parties. The response to the 
defeat of the Wilmot Proviso and passage of the 
Fugitive Slave Law in 1850 was the election of 
Charles Sumner to the Senate in April, 1851, and 



340 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

the establishment of the underground railroad in 
all the free States. When the South abrogated 
the Missouri Compromise, the North replied by the 
initiation of the Republican party. The Kansas 
outrages gave to freedom John Brown of Osawat- 
omie. And the answer to the Dred Scott decision 
was the nomination of Abraham Lincoln. Till 
that moment the forces of freedom and slavery had 
stood opposed, like two great armies, each receiv- 
ing constant recruits and an acccession of new 
power. On one side, hitherto, had been. all the 
political triumphs, and on the other all the moral. 
But with this first great political success of their 
opponents the slave power became wholly demoral- 
ized, gave up the conflict, threw away the results 
of all its former victories, and abandoned the field 
to its enemies, plunging into the dark abyss of seces- 
sion and civil war. 

And yet, what was the issue involved in that 
election ? It was simply whether slavery should 
or should not be extended into new Territories. 
All that the Republican party demanded was that 
slavery should not be extended. It did not dream 
of abolishing slavery in the slave States. We re- 
member how, long after the war began, we refused 
to do this. The Southerners had every guaranty 
they could desire that they should not be interfered 
with at home. If they had gracefully acquiesced 
in the decision of the majority, their institution 
might have flourished for another century. The 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 341 

Fugitive Slave Law would have been repealed ; or, 
at all events, trial by jury would have been given 
to the man claimed as a fugitive. But no attempt 
would have been made by the Republican party to 
interfere with slavery in the slave States, for that 
party did not believe it had the right so to do. 

But, in truth, the course of the Southern leaders 
illustrated in a striking way the distinction between 
a politician and a statesman. They were very acute 
politicians, trained in all the tactics of their art ; 
but they were poor statesmen, incapable of any 
large strategic plan of action. As statesmen, they 
should have made arrangements for the gradual 
abolition of slavery, as an institution incapable of 
sustaining itself in civilized countries in the nine- 
teenth century. Or, if they wished to maintain it 
as long as possible, they ought to have seen that 
this could only be accomplished by preserving the 
support of the interests and the public opinion of 
the North. Alliance with the Northern States was 
their only security ; and, therefore, they ought to 
have kept the Northern conscience on their side by 
a loyal adherence to all compacts and covenants. 
Instead of this, they contrived to outrage, one by 
one, every feeling of honor, every sentiment of 
duty, and every vested right of the free States, 
until, at last, it became plain to all that it was an 
" irrepressible conflict," and must be settled defi- 
nitely either for slavery or for freedom. When 
this point was reached by the American people, 



342 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

they saw also that it could not be settled in favor 
of slavery, for no concession would satisfy the slave- 
holders, and no contract these might make could be 
depended on. The North gave them, in 1850, the 
Fugitive Slave Law for the sake of peace. Did it 
gain peace ? No. It relinquished, for the sake 
of peace, the Wilmot Proviso. Was the South 
satisfied? No. In 1853 Mr. Douglas offered it 
the Nebraska Bill. Was it contented ? By no 
means. Mr. Pierce and Mr. Buchanan did their 
best to give it Kansas. Did they content the South 
by their efforts ? No. Mr. Douglas, Mr. Pierce, 
and Mr. Buchanan were all set aside by the South. 
The Lecompton Bill was not enough. The Dred 
Scott decision was not enough. The slaveholders 
demanded that slavery should be established by a 
positive act of Congress in all the Territories of 
the Union. Even Judge Douglas shrank aghast 
from the enterprise of giving them such a law as 
that ; and so Judge Douglas was immediately 
thrown aside. Thus, by the folly of the Southern 
leaders themselves, more than by the efforts of their 
opponents, the majority was obtained by the Re- 
publicans in the election of 1860. 

But during this conflict came many very dark 
days for freedom. One of these was after the pas- 
sage of the Fugitive Slave Law in 1850. That law 
was one of a series of compromises, intended to 
make a final settlement of the question and to si- 
lence all antislavery agitation. Although defended 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 343 

by great lawyers, who thought it necessary to save 
the Union, there is little doubt that it was as un- 
constitutional as it was cruel. The Constitution 
declares that " no person shall be deprived of his 
liberty without due process of law," and also that 
" in suits at common law, when the value in contro- 
versy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial 
by jury shall be preserved." Anthony Burns was 
in full possession of his liberty ; he was a self-sup- 
porting, tax-paying citizen of Massachusetts : and 
in ten days, by the action of the Fugitive Slave 
Law, he was turned into a slave under the decision 
of a United States commissioner, without seeing a 
judge or a jury. The passage of this law, and its 
actual enforcement, caused great excitement among 
the free colored people at the North, as well as 
among the fugitives from slavery. No one was 
safe. It was evident that it was meant to be en- 
forced, — it was not meant to be idle thunder. 
But instead of discouraging the friends of freedom, 
it roused them to greater activity. More fugitives 
than ever came from the slave States, and the 
underground railroad was in fuller activity than 
before. The methods employed by fugitives to es- 
cape were very various and ingenious. One man 
was brought away in a packing-box. Another 
clung to the lower side of the guard of a steamer, 
washed by water at every roll of the vessel. One 
well-known case was that of Ellen Crafts, who 
came from Georgia disguised as a young Southern 



344 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

gentleman, attended by her husband as body-ser- 
vant. She rode in the cars, sitting near Southern- 
ers who knew her, but did not recognize her in 
this costume, and at last arrived safe in Philadel- 
phia. In one instance a slave escaped from Ken- 
tucky, with all his family, walking some distance 
on stilts, in order to leave no scent for the pursu- 
ing blood-hounds. When these poor people reached 
the North, and told their stories on the antislavery 
platform, they excited great sympathy, which was 
not confined to professed antislavery people. A 
United States commissioner, who might be called 
on to return fugitives to bondage, frequently had 
them concealed in his own house, by the action of 
his wife, whose generous heart never wearied in 
this work, and who was the means of saving many 
from bondage. A Democratic United States mar- 
shal, in Boston, whose duty it was to arrest fugitive 
slaves, was in the habit of telling the slave-owner 
who called on him for assistance that he " did not 
know anything about niggers, but he would find 
out where the man was from those who did." 
Whereupon he would go directly to Mr. Garrison's 
office and tell him he wanted to arrest such or such 
a man, a fugitive from slavery. " But," said he, 
" curiously enough, the next thing I heard would 
be, that the fellow was in Canada." And when a 
colored man was actually sent back to slavery, as 
in the case of Burns, the event excited so much 
sympathy with the fugitive, and so much horror of 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 345 

the law, that its effects were disastrous to the slave 
power. Thomas M. Simrus was arrested in Boston 
as a fugitive from slavery, April 3, 1851, and was 
sent to slavery by the decision of George Ticknor 
Curtis, a United States commissioner. The answer 
to this act, by Massachusetts, was the election of 
Charles Sumner, twenty-one days after, to the 
United States Senate. Anthony Burns was re- 
turned to slavery by order of Edward G. Loring, 
in May, 1854; and Massachusetts responded by 
removing him from his office as Judge of Probate, 
and refusing his confirmation as a professor in Har- 
vard University. 

The passage of what were called the compromise 
measures of 1850, including the Fugitive Slave 
Law, had, it was fondly believed, put an end to the 
whole antislavery agitation. The two great parties, 
Whig and Democrat, had agreed that such should 
be the case. The great leaders, Henry Clay and 
Daniel Webster, Cass and Buchanan, were active 
in calling on the people to subdue their prejudices 
in favor of freedom. Southern fire-eaters, like 
Toombs and Alexander Stephens, joined these 
Union-savers, and became apostles of peace. Agi- 
tation was the only evil, and agitation must now 
come to an end. Public meetings were held in the 
large cities, — one in Castle Garden in New York, 
another in Faneuil Hall in Boston. In these meet- 
ings the lion and the lamb lay down together. 
Rufus Choate and Benjamin Hallet joined in de- 



346 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

manding that all antislavery agitation should now 
cease. The church was called upon to assist in the 
work of Union-saving, and many leading divines 
lent their aid in this attempt to silence those who 
desired that the oppressed should go free, and who 
wished to break every yoke. Many seemed to sup- 
pose that all antislavery agitation was definitely 
suppressed. President Fillmore called the com- 
promise measures " a final adjustment." All the 
powers which control human opinion — the two 
great political parties, the secular and the religious 
newspapers, the large churches and popular divines, 
the merchants and lawyers — had agreed that the 
antislavery agitation should now cease. 1 

But just at that moment, when the darkness was 

1 The writer of this article recalls a scene which occurred in his 
presence in the United States Senate early in 1851. Mr. Clay was 
speaking of the antislavery agitators and of the Free-Soil party, 
and said, with much bitterness, " We have put them down, — 
down, — down, where they will remain ; down to a place so low, 
that they can never get up again." John P. Hale, never at a loss 
for a reply, immediately arose and said, " The Senator from Ken- 
tucky says that I and my friends have been put down, — down, 
— down, where we shall have to stay. It may be so. Indeed, if 
the Senator says so, I am afraid it must be so. For, if there is any 
good authority on this subject, any man who knows by his own per- 
sonal and constant experience what it is to be put down, and to be 
kept down, it is the honorable Senator from Kentucky." Mr. 
Clay's aspirations had been so often baffled, that this was a very 
keen thrust. The writer spoke to Mr. Hale shortly after, and he 
said, " I do not think Mr. Clay will forgive me that hit ; but I 
could not help it. They may have got us down, but they shall 
not trample upon us." 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 347 

the deepest, and all the great powers in the church 
and state had decreed that there should be no more 
said concerning American slavery, the voice of a 
woman broke the silence, and American slavery- 
became the one subject of discussion throughout 
the world. " Uncle Tom's Cabin " was written by 
Mrs. Stowe for the " National Era," Dr. Bailey's 
paper in Washington. It was intended to be a 
short story, running through two or three numbers 
of the journal, and she was to receive a hundred 
dollars for writing it. But, as she wrote, the fire 
burned in her soul, a great inspiration came over 
her, and, not knowing what she was about to do, 
she moved the hearts of two continents to their 
very depths. After her story had appeared in the 
newspaper, she offered it as a novel to several pub- 
lishers, who refused it. Accepted at last, it had a 
circulation unprecedented in the annals of litera- 
ture. In eight weeks its sale had reached one hun- 
dred thousand copies in the United States, while 
in England a million copies were sold within the 
year. On the European Continent the sale was 
immense. A single publisher in Paris issued five 
editions in a few weeks, and before the end of 1852 
it was translated into Italian, Spanish, Danish, 
Swedish, Dutch, Flemish, German, Polish, and 
Magyar. To these were afterward added transla- 
tions into Portuguese, Welsh, Russian, Arabic, and 
many other languages. For a time, it stopped the 
publication and sale of all other works ; and within 



348 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

a year or two from the day when the politicians 
had decided that no more should be said concern- 
ing American slavery, it had become the subject of 
conversation and discussion among millions. 

" Uncle Tom's Cabin " was published in 1852. 
Those were very dark hours in the great struggle 
for freedom. Who that shared them can ever for- 
get the bitterness caused by the defection of Dan- 
iel Webster, and his 7th of March speech in 1850 ; 
by the passage of the Fugitive Slave Law, which 
made the whole area of the free States a hunting- 
ground for the slaveholders ; and by the rejection 
of the Wilmot Proviso, which abandoned all the 
new territory to slavery ? This was followed by 
the election of Franklin Pierce as President in 
1852, on a platform in which the Democratic party 
pledged itself to resist all agitation of the subject 
of slavery in Congress or outside of it. And in 
December, 1853, Stephen A. Douglas introduced 
his Nebraska Bill, which repealed the Missouri 
Compromise of 1820, and opened all the territory 
heretofore secured to freedom to slaveholders and 
their slaves. This offer on the part of Mr. Doug- 
las was a voluntary bid for the support of the slave- 
holders in the next Presidential election. And in 
spite of all protests from the North, all resistance 
by Democrats as well as their opponents, all argu- 
ments and appeals, this solemn agreement between 
the North and the South was violated, and every 
restriction on slavery removed. Nebraska and 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 349 

Kansas were organized as Territories, and the 
question of slavery left to local tribunals, or what 
was called " squatter sovereignty." 

The passage of this measure showed the vast 
political advance of the slave power in the country, 
and how greatly it had corrupted the political con- 
science of the nation. It also showed, to those 
who had eyes, that slavery was the wedge which 
was to split the Union asunder. But there were 
in the North many persons who still thought that 
danger to the Union came rather from the discus- 
sion of slavery than from slavery itself. They sup- 
posed that if all opposition to slavery should cease, 
then there would be no more danger. The Abo- 
litionists were the cause of all the peril ; and the 
way to save the Union was to silence the Abolition- 
ists. That, however, had been tried ineffectually 
when they were few and weak ; and now it was 
too late, as these Union-savers ought to have seen. 

Mr. Douglas and his supporters defended their 
cause by maintaining that the Missouri Compro- 
mise was not a contract, but a simple act of legis- 
lation, and they tauntingly asked, " Why, since 
antislavery men had always thought that Compro- 
mise a bad thing, should they now object to its 
being repealed?" Even this sophism had its 
effect with some, who did not notice that Doug- 
las's resolutions only repealed that half of the Com- 
promise which was favorable to freedom, while 
letting the other half remain. One part of the 



350 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

Act of 1820 was that Missouri should be admitted 
as a slave State ; the other part was that all the 
rest of the Territory should be forever free. Only 
the last part was now repealed. Missouri was left 
in the Union as a slave State. 

The political advance now made by slavery will 
appear from the following facts : — 

In 1797 the slave power asked for only life ; it 
did not wish to extend itself ; it united with the 
North in prohibiting its own extension into the 
Northwest Territory. 

In 1820 it did wish to extend itself ; it refused 
to be shut out of Missouri, but was willing that 
the rest of the Territory should be always free. 

In 1845 it insisted on extending itself by annex- 
ing Texas, but it admitted that it had no right to 
go into any Territory as far north as Missouri. 

In 1850 it refused to be shut out of any of the 
new territory, and resisted the Wilmot Proviso ; 
but still confessed that it had no right to go into 
Kansas or Nebraska. 

Five years after, by the efforts of Stephen A. 
Douglas and Franklin Pierce, it refused to be shut 
out of Kansas, and repealed the part of the Mis- 
souri Compromise which excluded it from that 
region. But, in order to accomplish this repeal, it 
took the plausible name of " popular sovereignty," 
and claimed that the people should themselves 
decide whether they would have a slave State or 
a free State. 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 351 

One additional step came. The people decided 
or were about to decide for freedom ; and then the 
slave power set aside its own doctrine of popular 
sovereignty and invaded the Territory with an 
army of Missourians, chose a legislature for the 
people of Kansas composed of Missourians, who 
passed laws establishing slavery and punishing 
with fine and imprisonment any who should even 
speak against it. 

The people of Kansas refused to obey these 
laws. They would have been slaves already if they 
had obeyed them. Then their own governor, ap- 
pointed by our President, led an army of Mis- 
sourians to destroy their towns and plunder and 
murder their people. Nothing was left them but 
to resist. They did resist manfully but prudently, 
and by a remarkable combination of courage and 
caution the people of the little Free-State town of 
Lawrence succeeded in saving themselves from this 
danger without shedding a drop of blood. Men, 
women, and children were animated by the same 
heroic spirit. The women worked by the side of 
the men. The men were placed on the outposts as 
sentinels and ordered by their general not to fire 
as long as they could possibly avoid it. And these 
men stood on their posts, and allowed themselves 
to be shot at by the invaders, and did not return 
the fire. One man received two bullets through 
his hat, and was ready to fire if the enemy came 
nearer, but neither fired nor quitted his post. 



352 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

The men were brave and obedient to orders ; the 
women were resolute, sagacious, and prudent. So 
they escaped their first great danger. 

But slavery does not give up its point so easily 
after one defeat. Preparations were made along 
the Missouri frontier for another invasion, con- 
ducted in a more military manner and by troops 
under better discipline. The Free-State people of 
Kansas were to be exterminated. From week to 
week they were expecting an attack, and had to 
watch continually against it. After having worked 
all day the men were obliged to do military duty 
and stand guard all night. Men who lived four 
and five miles out from Lawrence got wood and 
water for their wives in the morning, left them a 
revolver with which to defend themselves, and 
went to Lawrence to do military duty, returning 
at night again. 

If we had a writer gifted with the genius of 
Macaulay to describe the resistance of Kansas to 
the Federal authorities on one side and the Mis- 
souri invaders on the other, it would show as heroic 
courage and endurance as are related in the bril- 
liant pages which tell of the defense of London- 
derry. The invaders were unscrupulous, knowing 
that they had nothing to fear from the government 
at Washington. Senator Atchison, formerly the 
presiding officer of the United States Senate, 
openly advised the people of Missouri to go and 
vote in Kansas. General Stringfellow told them 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 353 

to take their bowie-knives and exterminate e very- 
scoundrel who was tainted with Free-soilisin or 
Abolitionism. The orders were obeyed. The first 
legislature was elected by armed invaders from 
Missouri, and Buford with a regiment of Southern 
soldiers entered the Territory in 1856, and sur- 
rounded Lawrence. These troops, under Atchi- 
son, Buford, and Stringfellow, burned houses and 
hotels, and stole much property. Osawatomie was 
sacked and burned, Leavenworth invaded and 
plundered, and Free-State men were killed. A 
proslavery constitution formed by Missouri slave- 
holders was forced through Congress, but rejected 
by the people of Kansas, who at last gained posses- 
sion of their own State by indomitable courage and 
patience. Four territorial governors, appointed by 
the President, selected from the Democratic party 
and favorable to the extension of slavery, were all 
converted to the cause of freedom by the sight of 
the outrages committed by the Missouri invaders. 

Amid this scene of tumult arose a warrior on 
the side of freedom destined to take his place with 
William Wallace and William Tell among the 
few names of patriots which are never forgotten. 
John Brown of Osawatomie was one of those 
who, in these later days, have reproduced for us 
the almost forgotten type of the Jewish hero and 
prophet. He was a man who believed in a God of 
justice, who believed in fighting fire with fire. He 
was one who came in the spirit and power of Eli- 



354 BISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

jali, an austere man, a man absorbed in his ideas, 
fixed as fate in pursuing them. Yet his heart was 
full of tenderness, he had no feeling of revenge 
toward any, and he really lost his own life rather 
than risk the lives of others. While in Kansas he 
become a leader of men, a captain, equal to every 
exigency. The ruffians from Missouri found to 
their surprise that, before they could conquer Kan- 
sas, they had some real fighting to do, and must 
face Sharpe's rifles ; and as soon as they under- 
stood this, their zeal for their cause was very much 
abated. In this struggle John Brown was being 
educated for the last scene of his life, which has 
lifted up his name, and placed it in that body 
which Daniel O'Connell used to call " The order 
of Liberators." l 

Out of these persecutions of Free-State men in 
Kansas came the assault on Charles Sumner, for 
words spoken in debate. Charles Sumner was 
elected to the United States Senate in 1851. He 
found in Congress some strong champions of free- 
dom. John Quincy Adams was gone ; but Seward 
was there, and Chase, and John P. Hale, in the 
Senate ; and Horace Mann, Giddings, and other 
true men in the House. Henry Wilson himself, 
always a loyal friend to Sumner, did not come till 
1855. These men all differed from one another, 
and each possessed special gifts for his arduous 

1 O'Connell, in an album belonging to John Howard Payne, 
writes this sentence after his name. 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 355 

work. They stood face to face with an imperious 
majority, accustomed to rule. They had only im- 
perfect support at home, — people and press at 
the North had been demoralized by slavery. They 
must watch their words, be careful of what they 
said, control their emotions, maintain an equal 
temper. Something of the results of this disci- 
pline we think we perceive in the calm tone of Mr. 
Wilson's volumes, and the absence of passion in 
his narration. These men must give no occasion 
to the enemy to blaspheme, but be careful of their 
lips and their lives. Their gifts, we have said, 
were various. Seward was a politician, trained in 
all the intricate ways of New York party strug- 
gles ; but he was also a thinker of no small power 
of penetration. He could see principles, but was 
too much disposed to sacrifice or postpone them to 
some supposed exigency of the hour. In his ora- 
tions, when he spoke for mankind, his views were 
large ; but in his politics he sometimes gave up to 
party his best-considered convictions. Thought 
and action, he seemed to believe, belonged to two 
spheres ; in his thought he was often broader in 
his range than any other senator, but in action he 
was frequently tempted to temporize. Mr. Chase 
was a man of a different sort. He had no disposi- 
tion to concede any of his views. A cautious man, 
he moved slowly ; but when he had taken his posi- 
tion, he was not disposed to leave it. John P. 
Hale was admirable in reply. His retorts were 



356 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

rapid and keen, and yet were uttered so good- 
naturedly, and with so much, wit, that it was diffi- 
cult for his opponents to take offense. But 
Charles Sumner was " the noblest Roman of them 
all." With a more various culture, a higher tone 
of moral sentiment, he was also a learned student 
and a man of implacable opinions. He never 
could comprehend Mr. Seward's diplomacy, and 
probably Mr. Seward could never understand Sum- 
ner's inability to compromise. He was deficient 
in imagination and in tact ; therefore he could not 
enter into the minds of others, and imperfectly 
understood them. But the purity of his soul and 
life, the childlike simplicity of his purposes, and 
the sweetness of his disposition, were very charm- 
ing to those who knew him well. Add to this the 
resources of a mind stored with every kind of 
knowledge, and a memory which never forgot any- 
thing, and his very presence in Washington gave 
an added value to the place. He had seen men 
and cities, and was intimate with European celeb- 
rities, but yet was an Israelite indeed in whom was 
no guile. Fond of the good opinions of others, 
and well pleased with their approbation, he never 
sacrificed a conviction to win their praise or to 
avoid their censure. Certainly, he was one of the 
purest men who ever took part in American poli- 
tics. 

It was such a man as this, so gifted and adorned, 
so spotless and upright, who by the wise provi- 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 357 

dence of God was permitted to be the victim of a 
brutal assassin. It was this noble head, the in- 
strument of laborious thought for the public wel- 
fare, which was beaten and bruised by the club of 
a ruffian, on May 22, 1856. Loud was the tri- 
umph through the South, great the joy of the slave 
power. They had disabled, with cruel blows, their 
chief enemy. Little did they foresee — bad men 
never do foresee — that Charles Sumner was to 
return to his seat, and become a great power in the 
land, long after their system had been crushed, and 
their proud States trampled into ruin by the tread 
of Northern armies. They did not foresee that he 
was to be the trusted counselor of Lincoln during 
those years of war ; and that, after they had been 
conquered, he would become' one of their best 
friends in their great calamity, and repay their 
evil with good. 

This murderous assault on Mr. Sumner cannot 
be considered as having strengthened the political 
position of the slave power. It was a great mis- 
take in itself, and it was a greater mistake in be- 
ing indorsed by such multitudes in the slave States. 
In thus taking the responsibility of the act, they 
fully admitted that brutality, violence, and cow- 
ardly attempts at assassination are natural char- 
acteristics of slavery. A thrill of horror went 
through the civilized world on this occasion. All 
the free States felt themselves outraged. That 
an attempt should be made to kill in his seat a 



358 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

Northern man, for words spoken in debate, was a 
gross insult and wrong to the nation, and deep- 
ened everywhere the detestation felt for the sys- 
tem. 

But madness must have its perfect work. One 
more step remained to be taken by the slave power, 
and that was to claim the right, under the Consti- 
tution, and protected by the general government, 
to carry slaves and slavery into all the Territories. 
It was not enough that they were not prohibited 
by acts of Congress. They must not allow the 
people of the Territories to decide for themselves 
whether slavery should exist among them or not. 
It had a right to exist there, in spite of the people. 
A single man from South Carolina, going with his 
slaves into Nebraska, should have the power of 
making that a slave State, though all the rest of its 
inhabitants wished it to be free. And if he were 
troubled by his neighbors, he had a right to call 
on the military power of the United States to pro- 
tect him against them. Such was the doctrine of 
the Dred Scott case, such the doctrine accepted by 
the majority of the United States Senate under the 
lead of Jefferson Davis in the spring of 1859. 
Such was the doctrine demanded by the Southern 
members of the Democratic Convention in Charles- 
ton, S. C, in May, 1860, and, failing to carry it, 
they broke up that convention. And it was be- 
cause they were defeated in this purpose of carry- 
ing slavery into the Territories that they seceded 



BISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 359 

from the Union, and formed the Southern Con- 
federacy. 

They had gained a long succession of political 
triumphs, which we have briefly traced in this 
article. They had annexed Texas, and made an- 
other slave State of that Territory. They had estab- 
lished the principle that slavery was not to be 
excluded by law from any of the Territories of the 
nation. They had repealed the Missouri Compro- 
mise, passed the Fugitive Slave Law, obtained the 
Dred Scott decision from the Supreme Court. In 
all this they had been aided by the Democratic 
party, and were sure of the continued help of that 
party. With these allies, they were certain to 
govern the country for a long period of years. 
The President, the Senate, the Supreme Court, 
were all on their side. As regarded slavery in the 
States, there was nothing to threaten its existence 
there. The Republicans proposed only to restrict 
it to the region where it actually existed, but could 
not and would not meddle with it therein. If the 
slave power had been satisfied with this, it seems 
probable that it might have retained its ascendency 
in the country for a long period. An immense 
region was still open to its colonies. Cotton was 
still king, and the slaveholders possessed all the 
available cotton-growing regions. They were 
wealthy, they were powerful, they governed the 
nation. They threw all this power away by seced- 
ing from the Union. Why did they do this ? 



360 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

The frequent answer to this question is con- 
tained in the proverb, " Whom the gods would de- 
stroy they first make mad." No doubt this act 
was one of madness, and no doubt it was providen- 
tial. But Providence works not by direct inter- 
ference, but by maintaining the laws of cause and 
effect. Why did they become so mad ? Why this 
supreme folly of relinquishing actual enormous 
power, in order to set their lives and fortunes on 
the hazard of a die ? 

It seems to be the doom of all vaulting ambition 
to overleap itself, and to fall on the other side. 
When Macbeth had gained all his ends, when he 
had become Thane of Cawdor and Glamis, and 
king, he had no peace, because the succession had 
been promised to Banquo : — 

" Upon my head they placed a fruitless crown, 
And put a barren sceptre in my gripe, 
Thence to be wrenched with an unlineal hand, 
No son of mine succeeding. If 't be so, 
For Banquo 's issue have I filed my mind, 
For them the gracious Duncan have I murthered, 
Put rancors in the vessel of my peace. 
. . . To make them kings, the seed of Banquo kings ! 
Rather than so, come fate into the list, 
And champion me to the utterance." 

When Napoleon the First was master of nearly 
all Europe, he could not be satisfied while Eng- 
land resisted his power, and Russia had not sub- 
mitted to it. So he also said, — 

" Rather than so, come fate into the list, 
And champion me to the utterance." 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 361 

He also threw away all his immense power because 
he could not arrest his own course or limit his own 
demands on fate. Such ambitions cannot stop, so 
long as there is anything unconquered or unpos- 
sessed. " All this avails me nothing, so long as I 
see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king's gate." 
The madness which seizes those greedy of power 
is like the passion of the gamester, who is unable 
to limit his desire of gain. By this law of insa- 
tiable ambition Providence equalizes destinies, and 
power is prevented from being consolidated in a 
few hands. 

The motive which actuates these ambitions, and 
makes them think that nothing is gained so long as 
anything remains to be gained, seems to be a secret 
fear that they are in danger of losing all unless 
they can obtain more. 

This inward dread appears to have possessed 
the hearts of the Southern slaveholders. Since 
slavery has been abolished, many of them admit 
that they have more content in their present 
poverty than they formerly had in their large 
possessions. They were then sensitive to every 
suggestion which touched their institution. Hence 
their persecution of Abolitionists, hence their 
cruelty to the slaves themselves, — for cruelty is 
often the child of fear. Hence the atrocity of the 
slave laws. Hence the desire to secure more and 
larger guaranties from the United States for their 
institution. Every rumor in the air troubled 



362 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

them. The fact that antislavery opinion existed 
at the North, that it was continually increasing, 
that a great political party was growing up which 
was opposed to their system, that such men as 
Garrison and Wendell Phillips existed in Boston, 
that Seward and Sumner were in the Senate, — 
all this was intolerable. The only way of ac- 
counting for Southern irritability, for Southern 
aggressions, for its perpetual demand for more 
power, is to be found in this latent terror. They 
doubted whether the foundations of their whole 
system were not rotten ; they feared that it rested 
on falsehood and lies ; they secretly felt that it 
was contrary to the will of God ; an instinct in 
their souls told them that it was opposed to the 
spirit of the age and the laws of progress; and 
this fear made them frantic. 

When men's minds are in this state, they are 
like the glass toy called a Rupert's bubble. A 
single scratch on the surface causes it to fly in 
pieces. The scratch on the surface of the slave 
system which caused it to rush into secession and 
civil war was the attempt of John Brown on 
Harper's Ferry. It seemed a trifle, but it indi- 
cated a great deal. It was the first drop of a com- 
ing storm. When one man was able to lay down 
his life, in a conflict with their system, with such 
courage and nobleness, in a cause not his own, a 
shudder ran through the whole South. To what 
might this grow ? And so they said, " Let us cut 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 363 

ourselves wholly off from these dreadful fanati- 
cisms, from these terrible dangers. Let us make a 
community of our own, and shut out from it en- 
tirely all antislavery opinion, and live only with 
those who think as we do." And so came the end. 

In reviewing Mr. Wilson's work, we have thus 
seen how it describes the gradual and simultaneous 
growth in the United States of two hostile powers, 
— one political, the other moral. The one con- 
tinued to accumulate the outward forces which 
belong to the organization ; the other, the inward 
forces which are associated with enthusiasm. The 
one added continually to its external strength by 
the passage of new laws, the addition of new terri- 
tory, the more absolute control of parties, govern- 
ment, courts, the press, and the street. The other 
increased its power by accumulating an intenser 
conviction, a clearer knowledge, a firmer faith, and 
a more devoted consecration to its cause. The 
weapons of the one were force, adroitness, and 
worldly interest ; those of the other, faith in God, 
in man, and in truth. 

Great truths draw to their side noble auxiliaries. 
So it was with the antislavery movement. The 
heroism, the romance, the eloquence, the best 
literature, the grandest forms of religion, the most 
generous and purest characters, — all were brought 
to it by a sure affinity. As Wordsworth said to 
Toussaint l'Ouverture, so it might be declared 
here : — 



364 BISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWEE 

tl Thou hast great allies ; 
Thy friends are exaltations, agonies, 
And love, and man's unconquerable mind." 

The best poets of America, Bryant, Longfellow, 
Whittier, Lowell, were in full sympathy with this 
cause, and their best poetry was their songs for 
freedom. Shall we ever forget the caustic humor 
of "Hosea Biglow" and " Birdof redum Sawin"? 
And how lofty a flight of inspiration did the same 
bard take, when he chanted in verses nobler, as it 
seems to us, than anything since Wordsworth's 
" Ode to Immortality," the Return of the Heroes 
who had wrought salvation for the dear land 
" bright beyond compare " among the nations ! 
What heroism, what tenderness, what stern re- 
buke, what noble satire, have attended every event 
in this long struggle, from the lyre of Whittier ! 
Nothing in Campbell excels the ring of some of 
his trumpet-calls, nothing in Cowper the pathos of 
his elegies over the martyrs of freedom. The 
best men and the best women were always to be 
found at the meetings of the Antislavery Society. 
There were to be seen such upright lawyers as 
Ellis Gray Loring and Samuel E. Sewall and John 
A. Andrew, such eminent writers as Emerson, 
such great preachers as Theodore Parker and 
Beecher, such editors as Bryant and Greeley. To 
this cause did William Ellery Channing devote 
his last years and best thoughts. If the churches 
as organizations stood aloof, being only " timidly 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 365 

good," as organizations are apt to be, the purest of 
their body were sure to be found in this great 
company of latter-day saints. 

Antislavery men had their faults. They were 
often unjust to their opponents, though uninten- 
tionally so. They were sometimes narrow and 
bitter ; and with them, as with all very earnest 
people, any difference of opinion as to methods 
seemed to involve moral obliquity. But they were 
doing the great work of the age, — the most neces- 
sary work of all, — and much might be pardoned 
to their passionate love of justice and humanity. 
In their meetings could be heard many of the 
ablest speakers of the time, and one, the best of 
all. He held the silver bow of Apollo, and dread- 
ful was its clangor when he launched its shafts 
against spiritual wickedness in high places. Those 
deadly arrows were sometimes misdirected, and 
occasionally they struck the good men who were 
meaning to do their duty. Such errors, we sup- 
pose, are incident to all who are speaking and act- 
ing in such terrible earnest ; in the great day of 
accounts many mistakes will have to be rectified. 
But surely among the goodly company of apostles 
and prophets, and in the noble army of martyrs 
there assembled, few will be found more free from 
the sins of selfish interest and personal ambition 
than those who in Congress, in the pulpit, on the 
platform, or with the pen, fought the great battle 
of American freedom. 



366 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

One great moral must be drawn from this story 
before we close. It demonstrates, by a great his- 
torical proof, that no evil however mighty, no 
abuse however deeply rooted, can resist the power 
of truth faithfully uttered and steadily applied. 
If this great institution of slavery, resting on such 
a foundation of enormous pecuniary interest, but- 
tressed by such powerful supports, fell in the life 
of a single generation before the unaided power of 
truth, why should we ever despair ? Henceforth, 
whenever a mighty evil is to be assailed, or a cruel 
despotism overthrown, men will look to this his- 
tory of the greatness and decadence of slavery ; 
and, so encouraged, will believe that God is on the 
side of justice, and that truth will always prevail 
against error. 

But to this we must add, that it is only where 
free institutions exist that truth has full power in 
such a conflict. We need free speech, a free 
press, free schools, and free churches, in order that 
truth may have a free course. The great advan- 
tage of a republic like ours is, that it gives to 
truth a fair chance in its conflict with error. The 
Southern States would long ago have abolished 
slavery if it had possessed such institutions. But, 
though republican in form, the Southern States 
were in reality an oligarchy, in which five millions 
of whites and three millions of slaves were gov- 
erned by the absolute and irresponsible power of 
less than half a million of slaveholders. Freedom 



RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 367 

was permitted by them except when this institution 
was concerned, then it was absolutely forbidden. 
No book written against their peculiar institution 
could be printed on any Southern press or sold in 
any Southern bookstore. No newspaper attacking 
slavery was allowed to be circulated through 
Southern mails. No public meeting could be held 
to discuss the right and wrong of slavery. No 
minister could preach against the system. No 
man could express, even in conversation, his hos- 
tility to it, without risk of personal injury. An 
espionage as sharp, and an inquisition as relentless 
as those of Venice or Spain, governed society, at 
least in the cotton and sugar States of the Union. 
But at the North opinion was free, and therefore 
slavery fell. Fisher Ames compressed in an epi- 
gram the evil and good of republican institutions. 
" In a monarchy," said he, " we are in a ship, very 
comfortable while things go well ; but strike a 
rock, and we go to the bottom. In a republic, we 
are on a raft ; our feet are wet, and it is not always 
agreeable, but we are safe." It is a lasting proof 
of the conservative power of free institutions, that 
they were able to uproot such a system as slavery 
by creating a moral force capable of putting it 
down ; that they could carry us through a civil 
war, still leaving the press and speech free : that 
they stood the strain of a presidential election 
without taking from the voters a single right ; and 
so, at last, conquered a rebellion on so vast a scale 



368 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 

that every European monarchy, with its immense 
standing army, would have been powerless in its 
presence. Let those Americans who are disposed 
to disparage their own institutions ,bear this his- 
tory in mind. We have evils here, and great 
ones ; but they come at once to the surface, and 
therefore can be met and overcome by the power 
of intelligent opinion. So it has always been in 
the past; so it will be, God aiding us, in the 
future. We are about to meet the Centennial 
Anniversary of our national life ; and on that day 
we can look back to our fathers, the founders of 
the Republic, and say to them, — " You gave us 
the inestimable blessing of free institutions ; we 
have used those institutions to destroy the only 
great evil which you transmitted to us untouched. 
We now can send down the Republic to our chil- 
dren, pure from this stain, and capable of enduring 

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